A Length of Deeply Toned Striped Cotton: Hand Spun and Hand Woven

late nineteenth century
65" x 13 1/2", 165 cm x 34 cm

This is a length of old striped cloth whose gradient, complex stripes evoke the iridescent surface of the skin of a fish. Stripes like this are referred to as katsuojima or, literally, "bonito fish stripe."

The cloth is beautifully hand woven from hand spun yarns and it is still sturdy although it is missing a bit of its left-side selvedge and has repairs in the form of patches on the reverse side of the length (not shown here, except for an indication on the lead photo to this post).
On the upper left hand quadrant there is a hand stitched kanji or Chinese character of three parallel horizontal lines done in white cotton.

The color is rich and deep, the subtleties are there. This is a beautiful length of old, striped cotton cloth.