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Volume 3 180 |
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A–Z |  |
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TATTOOED LADY AT HER LOOM |
AINU ARISTOCRATS ARRAYED FOR A FESTIVE OCCASION |
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| Probably in connexion with some ancient taboo Ainu women disfigure themselves by tattooing their mouth. The process is begun in childhood, and by the time a girl marries her blue-black moustache extends almost from ear to ear | Last representatives of the original races that inhabited Japan, the Ainu now occupy the island of Yezo, or Hokkaido. They are a muscular, well-set-up people of rather pleasing appearance, whose most notable physical attribute is their profuse coarse black hair, which is the object of their especial care and much superstitious feeling |