Posted by Dan (24.58.6.220) on October 13, 2004 at 17:27:38:
In Reply to: (finger) Nails in Ukiyo-e posted by Peter Gallagher on October 11, 2004 at 22:24:51:
Hi Peter,
I think your interesting post provides a good object lesson in cultural relativity. It's easy to forget how extremely "unnatural" everything we take for granted is, not only in other places, but in other times.
In brief, I think your short answer--"because that's how they kept their nails"--is right. And this holds true I believe not only of ukiyo-e and the Tokugawa Period, but of other periods and styles of Japanese art--indeed for much of the pre-modern world.
As to the question "why?" one might equally say "why would you expect otherwise?" Which isn't to say that nail fashion didn't exist at all in pre-modern times. In India, for example, the tips of female fingers seem to have been dipped and dyed in henna. But nail fashion seems to have been by no means universal, not even in pre-modern Europe.
A better answer to "why" probably goes first to the practical aspect, and then to the social reading of the body.
One reason not to grow nails in the Japanese context is the number of items that had to be carefully manipulated manually, such as chopsticks, cooking utensils, needle and thread etc. Even the more leisurely courtesan had to deal with some of these, as well as musical instruments, pipes, customers sensitive parts etc. For the woman in the family house though, long or decorated fingernails would simply not be practical--they'd be chipped, broken, burned and blackened in no time flat.
In this context, it's noteworthy that a number of feminists consider modern female fashion, like extended nails and high heels, to be "sexy" precisely because they make the woman appear immobilized and weakened, less capable of physical labor. The extreme version of these fashions, they say, is foot binding. But weakness was not valued in the early modern house wife in Japan.
The second reason probably has to do with religion and cultural readings of the body. Keeping the body in control, taming the hair and shaping the physical features, seems to have been important in the Japanese content. Outlaws have long, wild hair, not heroes. And as you noted, the only place one sees extended ("wild") nails is on animals and supernatural creatures. So I expect short nails were part of body control.
I do seem to remember some literary reference to fingernails though, something along the lines of them appearing as polished shells. I'll have to check that, and see where and when it came.