Description
An original pair of molded plaster Japanese Inari temple foxes. Crushed oyster shell finish with rinpa mineral paint detailing in traditional Shinto colorways : orange, purple, green. Each of the foxes has a soft rimpa pink underbelly. Wonderful original and complete condition. Each fox sits atop a base as a single piece.
Age: Meiji Period (1868 – 1912)
Dimensions: 9 1/2″ wide x 6 1/2″ deep x 19 1/2″ high
Inari Ōkami (Japanese: 稲荷大神), also called Ō-Inari (大稲荷), is the Japanese kami of foxes, fertility, rice, tea and sake, of agriculture and industry, of general prosperity and worldly success
According to myth, Inari, as a goddess, was said to have come to Japan at the time of its creation amidst a harsh famine that struck the land. “She [Inari] descended from Heaven riding on a white fox, and in her hand she carried sheaves of cereal or grain. Ine, the word now used for rice, is the name for this cereal. What she carried was not rice but some cereal that grows in swamps. According to legend, in the ancient times Japan was water and swamp land
