ABSTRACT
The beginnings. of the ten-chi-fin school date from the middle of the 19th century. The founder of the school was Mishosai Ippo, who later came to be better known as the originator of the Misho School. The nature and characteristics of the school ten-chi-jin may be best illustrated by a concrete example. Suppose there are three branches of cherry blossoms of different length to be arranged. The longest branch will be called ten, heaven, the medium length fin, man, the shortest chi, earth. The heaven branch will be put in the middle of the vase, the man branch at one side, and the earth branch in front of the heaven branch. If lines are drawn passing through the end of each branch, an irregular triangle will be formed. According to this school of flower arrangement, the form must be triangular. The art of flower arrangement as taught by this school was, no doubt, very simple at the beginning, but as time went on, the followers of the school became tired of its simplicity and monotony, and began
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to seek some variety and complexity in their arrangements_ Thus. we find that by the end of the 19th century, having completely lost sight of their original purpose, which was only. to express the simple and natural beauty of flowers and trees, the ten-chi·/in group had come to resort to such devices as wooden stoppers and metal wire. And they seem to have been perfectly satisfied with a form of art which appears to us today no better than a piece of artificiality. They were apparently untroubled at the unnaturalness or forced beauty of their arrangements, which some of them might have detected, since they were concerned only with flowers and trees which were pliable enough to yield them their favourite patterns or designs. Their favourite trees and flowers were such as the parlour
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palm, £tas1tg£ (cypress), podocarpus chinensis, the Scotch broom, the purple willow, the basket willow, and the enko willow.
