Lady from the “Visiting Kawachi” Episode of the Tales of Ise

The body of a single female figure forms a dramatic S-shape against a blank background. With her right hand she raises her hem, providing us with a better view of the design motifs that adorn her robes: maple leaves, deer, and autumn flowers and grasses on a white outer robe, and chrysanthemums and cresting waves on her red inner robe. This combination of motifs alludes to a poem from “Visiting Kawachi, ” a single episode of the tenth-century Tales of Ise, allowing her to be identified as the unnamed heroine of that episode.