Like many Japanese customs, the origins of Hinamatsuri are closely connected to early ties with China. Purification rituals can be traced back to the Zhou Dynasty in China (around 1046 - 256 BCE). Over the centuries, rituals grew to include feasts and prayers before eventually taking a formal place in society. The Shangsi Festival took place on the third day of the third lunar month and is still celebrated by certain Chinese ethnic groups today.
The spread of purification rituals in Japan through Chinese influence led to the evolution of a ritual called Nagashibina, where paper dolls were floated down rivers in the hopes that sickness and bad luck would be carried away with them. This practice was widespread through the Nara period (from 710 to 794 CE), but didn’t merge with the March celebrations until the mid Heian period (around 900 CE). Around this time, the practice of playing with Hina dolls began among aristocratic girls.
These concurrent practices slowly started intertwining, but it wasn’t until 1687 that the holiday was officially named Hinamatsuri. It’s said that Japan’s penultimate empress, empress Meisho, used to play with her dolls by placing them on platforms in accurate imperial formation, leading to the custom of displayed dolls replacing the floating paper ones.
As the festival became more popular, doll markets, or hinaichi, began to flourish. The annual bustle of shopping for beautifully crafted dolls moved the festival beyond ritual to become an be exciting annual event. The added element of commercialization added some competition to the practice, with wealthy families splurging on elaborate many-tiered displays.
As modernization swept through Japan in the Meiji period, the country traded traditional seasonal festivals for national holidays, and Hinamatsuri fell widely out of practice. Over time, with new opportunities for commercialization, traditional customs were reignited. Now, every March 3rd, elegant hina dolls representing the emperor, empress, imperial attendants, and musicians of the Heian period line red tiered platforms all over the country, and stores are stocked full of traditional Hinamatsuri foods.
A typical menu for the holiday will include chirashizushi, sushi rice topped with sashimi, lotus root, shredded egg, and nori. These ingredients are partly symbolic, with lotus root to foresee the future, shrimp to signify longevity, and the variety of ingredients signifying hopes that the daughter will have abundance through her life. Clam soup, strawberry daifuku, hina-arare, and hishi mochi are also common options, with each dish carrying hopes of health and happiness.
While not an official holiday, Hinamatsuri is still celebrated by today, around 3,000 years after the first seeds for the festival were sown. Coinciding with the first blooms of peach blossoms, Hinamatsuri was also known as Momo no Sekku, or “peach festival”. Colorful decorations and brightly colored treats will be enjoyed around Japan, offering families the opportunity to celebrate daughters and reflect on the cultural threads that spool through their families, linking the colorful dolls of today to the ones crafted centuries ago.
The decorations, warming weather and spring buds make for a joyful introduction to a new season. Though people today may be able to find more variations of hina dolls than before, like Hello Kitty plushies or Disney figurines dressed as Heian period royalty, these decorations still offer a persistent link to the past and an optimism for future health and happiness.
By C. Taevs-Nakaya