Picture wife - Esu-gata Nyobo

A folk tale. A marriage tale with the theme of falling in love with a woman one has met indirectly. A man marries a beautiful woman from the Dragon Palace and does not leave her side. The wife paints a portrait of herself for him to carry when she goes to work. One day, the portrait is blown away by the wind. It falls into the lord's castle. The lord sees the portrait and wants to marry the woman, so he has his servants search for her. When the wife leaves, she tells her husband to come to the castle disguised as a peddler. When the husband goes to the castle to sell goods, the woman smiles for the first time upon hearing this. The lord is delighted and exchanges clothes with the peddler. The lord is chased out of the castle disguised as a peddler, and the husband becomes the lord himself. In the Manno Choja tale, this tale is combined with "The Charcoal-burning Choja" to form the latter part, and the "portrait of the wife" part can be seen in the ancient "Eboshiori" dance of Kouwaka-mai. There are also examples of stories that serve as origin stories for religious entertainers, and there seems to have been a time when they were told and spread by entertainers. The idea of ​​flying pictures developed in East Asia, and similar stories can be found in Korea, Mongolia, the Han Chinese, Miao people, Pai people of mainland China, and Tibet. The Mongolian collection of Buddhist tales, "Siddhi-Kul," includes a story in which a picture simply changes into hair, and there are many similar stories in India as well. Although the overall format does not match, marriage tales in which people fall in love after seeing a picture or something similar are also found in large numbers in Europe, such as "Faithful Johannes" in the collection of fairy tales by the Brothers Grimm.

[Yo Kojima]

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

昔話。間接的に知った女に恋することを主題にした婚姻譚(たん)の一つ。竜宮からきた美しい女を妻にした男が、妻のそばを離れない。妻は自分の絵姿を描いて持たせ、仕事に行かせる。ある日、絵姿を風に飛ばされる。絵は殿様の城に落ちる。絵を見た殿様は、その女を妻にしたいと思い、家来に探させる。妻は別れるとき、夫に、物売りになって城に来いという。夫が城に物売りに行くと、それを聞いて、女が初めて笑う。喜んだ殿様は、物売りと衣服を取り替える。物売り姿の殿様は城から追い出され、夫は殿様になる。満野長者(まんのちょうじゃ)譚では、「炭焼き長者」と複合して後段をなし、その「絵姿女房」の部分は、古く、幸若舞(こうわかまい)の「烏帽子折(えぼしおり)」のなかにみえる。宗教芸人の由来譚になっている例もあり、芸人によって語り広められた時代もあったらしい。絵姿を飛ばす趣向は東アジアで発達しており、類話は、朝鮮、モンゴル、中国大陸の漢族、ミャオ族、パイ族、チベットにある。モンゴルの仏教説話集『シッディ・キュル』には、絵姿が髪の毛に変化しただけの話があり、この系統の類話はインドにも多い。全体の形式までは一致しないが、絵像などを見て恋する婚姻譚は、グリム兄弟の昔話集の「忠義なヨハネス」など、ヨーロッパにも多数分布している。

［小島瓔］

出典　小学館　日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ)日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ)について　情報 | 凡例