Snowman (yukidaruma)

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Snowman (yukidaruma, Japan)

***** Location: Japan, other countries
***** Season: All Winter
***** Category: Humanity

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Explanation

snowman, yukidaruma ゆきだるま,雪だるま、雪達磨
..... sunooman スノーマン

other forms of the Japanese snow figures are

snow rabbit, yuki usagi 雪兎, 雪うさぎ



snow lion, yukijishi 雪獅子
..... Lion Dance, shishimai 獅子舞

snow "Hotei", yuki hotei 雪布袋
..... Hotei, one of the seven gods of good luck
Children in northern China make snowmen modeled after Maitreya, in his incarnation as Pu Tai/Hotei.


.............................. Everyone knows a snowman, but
why do the Japanese call it "Snow Daruma"?

Read it all in Gabi Greve's story on this subject:
http://www.amie.or.jp/daruma/Yukidaruma.html





The word yuki daruma might have come to common use around the same time when the red Daruma dolls became more popular in the town of Edo and the rest of Japan. That was maybe toward the beginning of the Meiji period, when the sericultural industry hit the silk market and many Daruma dolls were used as protective talisman of the silk cocoons.

A Japanese snowman is usually made of two large balls (like a Daruma Doll, without legs), whereas one in Europe and America has three snowballs piled on each other, feet, body and head.

Snow Man, Yuki Otoko,　雪男 is a kind of monstrous man-beast, for example like the Yeti in the Himalayas. He is known in Japan too in areas with a lot of snow.

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Snow Buddha, yuki-botoke, yukibotoke (yuki no hotoke) ゆきぼとけ、雪仏、雪佛

This word was already used in the Essays in Idleness,　Tsurezure Gusa 徒然草
by the monk Yoshida Kenkō around 1330.

"On a spring day, we made a snowman ..." (haru no hi ni yukibotoke o tsukurite 春の日に雪佛を作りて).
Passage 66.

Kobayashi Issa uses this word, which was common at his time, when Daruma was not popular yet.

Snow Buddha, since the figures of two snowballs on each other with a simple face somehow remind the Japanese of the stone statues of Buddhist deities at the roadside.

In Japanese it was a normal way to express what we call "SNOWMAN" in English, so the translation of "snow Buddha" might carry too much religiously tainted weight ... ?
Translating Haiku Forum
How to translate: yukibotoke ?


Other Japanese words with this use of HOTOKE are:
stone Budda, stone stele, ishibotoke 石仏
Buddha statue in the fields, nobotoke　野仏

... ... ...

toru toshi mo anata makase zo yuki-botoke

growing old too
I trust in a Buddha
of snow

Shinji Ogawa paraphrases, "On my growing old too (like anything else) I trust in you... Snow Buddha." He comments, "Issa's object of prayer is the Snow Buddha which is nothing but a snowman made by some kids." See more below.
http://cat.xula.edu/issa Tr. David Lanoue

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うす雪の仏を作る子ども哉
usu yuki no hotoke o tsukuru kodomo kana

he rolls thin snow
into a Buddha...
the child
(Tr. David Lanoue)

children -
they make a snowman
out of thin snow
(Tr. Gabi Greve)

Read a discussion of these translations !　


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Worldwide use

Different names for our SNOWMAN

Czech: sněhulák m.
Danish: snemand c.
Dutch: sneeuwpop
Finnish: lumiukko
French: bonhomme de neige m.
German: Schneemann m.
Icelandic: snjókarl m.
Italian: pupazzo di neve m., fantoccio di neve m.
Korean: 눈사람 (nunsaram)
Latvian: sniegavīrs m.
Polish: bałwan m.
Romanian: om de zapada= man of snow
Slovak: snehuliak m.
Swedish: snögubbe c.

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Lithuania

In Lithuania, a snowman is called "a man without brains". As a sign of protest against their government, in the winter of 2005, Lithuanians made 141 snowmen near their parliament—one for each member of Parliament.

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Russia

Snowwoman
We Russians make snowwomen in winter.

Zhanna Rader

снежная баба (snéžnaja bába) f.
снеговик (snegovík) m.

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Things found on the way

"Snow lady, snow woman", yuki onna 雪女

This is a kind of monster of Japanese legends. It might also be the "fairy of snow", so to speak, the personification of the soul of the snow, for the Japanese reader.

She is often seen on full moon nights and around the New Year.

Some say this expression refers to a particular physical quality of the snow of Northern Japan, when the conditions of humidity, coldness and moonlight are just right.

Lafcadio Hearn also wrote about this "Snow Woman".

Gabi Greve

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A Snowman playing with Water
yukibotoke no mizu asobi 雪仏（ゆきぼとけ）の水遊び

This is a Japanese proverb pointing at a person who behaves in a way dangerous to himself.


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HAIKU

o-hiza ni suzume naku nari yuki-botoke

a sparrow chirping
in his lap...
snow Buddha

There are 21 haiku with this kigo in the Issa archives.
http://cat.xula.edu/issa/searchissa.php?a_id=144&show_e=T&colors=T

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the snowman
on his wrinkled hat
a bread crumb

Geert Verbeke

Read more of Geert's Snowman Haiku here:
http://happyhaiku.blogspot.com/2004/01/friends-geert-verbeke.html


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Related words

***** Snow
http://worldkigodatabase.blogspot.com/2006/07/snow-yuki.html


***** (WKD - TOPICS): Dead Body (hotoke)

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