House of the Pliant Pine - Geisha in Emerald and Jade

There are countless geisha in Emerald and Jade. You can can read some basic info about geisha in Rokugan here. These are some houses that are well-known, for whatever reason: Geisha House House of Pliant Pine House of Foreign Stories House of Winter Moon House of Evening Star Location Pleasure City Ryoko Owari Otosan Uchi Ukabu Mura

Kitagawa Utamaro Japanese, 1753-1806 Geisha with Samisen, from the series Daughters of Edo Who Chant Drama, c. 1805 Color woodblock print

Geisha in Rokugan

Who’s who:

The house is usually run by the okasan, or madame.

Tayu are high ranking geisha prepared for nobles. For example, the House of the Evening Star in Ukabu Mura prepares geisha for House of Winter Moon in Otosan Uchi.

All tayu (and geisha) in training are schooled by an older, retired geisha, known as the yarite. They sometimes also have a kamuro, a young girl in training to be a geisha, as a body servant, and they typically wear pine-leaf kimonos. Servants in general wear indigo kimonos.

Some traditional practices:

Some geisha also displayed behind bars in houses and sing to attract patrons. Also, it is customary to display the rich gifts a geisha receives from her patron in the entrance of her house. It is always fine or exquisite bedding, usually silk. (Futon, sheet, blanket as set of three).There are sometimes private huts (or barges) for patron to meet the geisha, called the ageya.

Courtesans meet their clients three times, offering themselves only on the third meeting, after third week of paying. The tayu proceeds publicly to the ageya in a formal procession using large circular steps.

If one patron has an appointment and another pays for the services for that evening, the one with lower social status is obliged to yield gracefully and just be entertained normally (and the payment is kept, as samurai cannot haggle over money).