Kabuki (plays)
The purpose of Kabuki was simply to give pleasure by entertaining the audience in a full-blooded way. Fairly large orchestras, consisting of clappers, drums, flutes, and the three-stringed samisen provided the plays with a variety of musical accompaniment occasionally augmented by vocal recitative. The essential strength of Kabuki lay in its visual appeal. Elaborate scenery, costumes, and makeup combined with the formal poses (mie) of the actors to produce a series of brilliant and compelling spectacles, and an undercurrent of almost sensual excitement @_@.

Kago (palanquins)
Palanquins like boxes suspended from a pole which the bearers bore on their shoulders. The chair-men could be a rough characters, as indicated by tattooing on their backs and shoulders.

Kami-shimo (clothes)
The formal part of a samurai's attire. It's the combination of 'upper and lower', that is, an over-jacket (kataginu) with stiffened shoulders and trousers (hakama). Beneath the kami-shimo, the ordinary kimono was worn, with a girdle behind which the straps of the shoulder garment were inserted, and underneath that a white undergarment which showed at the neck. The swords in their scabbards were held by this girdle, the costume was completed by white tabi - socks with a padded sole and a division between the big toe and the smallers ones to allow for the thong of the footwear, when that was worn..

Kimono (clothes)
Generally speaking, colors for samurai clothes were very somber, being mainly dullish blues, grays and browns, either plain or with small patterns or stripes. The shoulder-jacket and kimono worn beneath it normally bore the wearer's family crest, his mon. Hakama were lined for winter wear, unlined for summer wear, the dates for the change being fixed at the fifth day of the fifth month and the first day of the ninth month. Off-duty dress was the kimono without haori or hakama.

Kotatsu (heater)
A charcoal heater with a framework rather like a table placed over it, and then this was covered with a quilt large enough to spread over the legs of those who sat at it, so that hot air found its way up through the clothing, and the hands could be put underneath the quilt to warm them as necessary. It was also possible to sleep at a kotatsu. It was usual to start up the kotatsu on the first day of the boar (i.e. the twelfth) of the tenth month. Some recent Japanese still use it in the winter, but of course they used an electrical heater instead of charcoal.

Machi-bugyo (magistrates)
Town magistrates (2) who between them combined what would now be the functions of chief of police, judge and mayor. They did not, however, divide these functions between themselves, but each performed them all, being on duty for a month and off duty for the next. However, as the polpulation of Edo increased with the tendency of people to move in from the country whenever they could, the duties of the magistrate grew more onerous, and he was glad to make full use of his month off duty to catch up with all the reports and inquiries relating to his last month on duty.

Miso (food)
Miso is made from soya beans, which are first treated rather like butter-beans, being allowes to soak and then boiled. After this they are broken down to a paste and mixed with rice-yeast, salt and water, and left to ferment and mature for SOME YEARS! The result is a brownish-red, fibrous liquid that can be diluted in water. It has a characteristic taste and smell. Miso soup couldhave vegetables, such as the leaves of plants like pasley and celery, or edible stems of roots, such as those of lotus, cooked with it, or those could be served separately, boiled and with flavouring, such as bean-paste with aromatic seeds.

Naga-bakama (clothes)
On ordinary occasions for samurai of all ranks, and for lower-ranking ones at all times, hakama finished at a little above ground-level, but for superior ranking warriors at special ceremonies, very long hakama were worn; these trailed on the floor and the feet were entirely enclosed within them. The wearing of this naga-bakama required special skill; any change of direction had to be accompanied by sharp movements of the feet to bring the trailing portion behind the wearer, otherwise there was danger of tripping; he must also grip each leg of the hakama, pulling it up at every step to give his leg room for movement. It was possible to run in them, but this required extremely good coordination between hand and leg (My... what an impraticable and imposing garment).

No (play)
One of the classic forms of theater in Japan, the No drama, was another product of Muromachi high society. No has been built on Zen techniques of suggestion and stylized implication. The masks worn by the actors when playing female and certain male roles are evidence of the continuing vitality of craft that goes back to the Nara period. The most meaningful moments in a performance are those when an actor has just finished a gesture or a dance or a speech and then, in complete silence and stillness, manages to do more than merely hold the attention of the spectators. Today No appeals only to small groups of devotees, but when it developed in the fifteenth century, it was widely popular.

Onmyoushi (astrologers)
In addition to the priesthood, there were the onmyoushi, who were skilled in the Chinese science of ying and yang, the negative and positive principles in life. Their concern was with the calendar and the stars, with the compass directions and with physiognomy, and they gave advice about myriad human activities. The date of a marriage was chosen with due regard to the horoscopes of the participants; the date when building a house should commence, the direction in which it should face, the disposition of its rooms (Feng Sui) all depended upon their instructions.

Roushi/rounin (wave samurai)
Samurai who had no official income at all and no right to a residence; these are the masterless men, who had either abandoned their allegiance or whose master had been deprived of his post (like the Akou Roushi). The roushi were some of the freest status without the burden of its duties, but forgoing its assured sustenance. They earned a living as best they could: some became writers, Confucian scholars or schoolteachers; some, instructors in swordsmanship or other military arts; others traded on their ability with their weapons and hired themselves out as bodyguards and troubleshooters for rich merchants. While they were earning, they could afford comfortable accommodation; when things went less well, they had to live at best in temples (like Shinsengumi), at worst in what rough shelter they could find.

Sake (beverages)
The alcoholic liquor prepared from rice and drunk on festive occasions (tastes real good ^^). It was warmed before being served, when it was poured into a very small cups. Its manufacture was limited to the winter season, and provided a very convenient off-season employment for men from the northern parts. Sake-brewing for home consumption was also a winter occupation on larger farms, and well-to-do town families would also employ specialists to come and make sake on the premises, from rice that they had bought for the purpose (watch Store House of Dreams, NHK, 1995 to learn more about sake-brewing).

Samurai (rank/class)
The highest of four classes which the people of Japan were divided in Bakufu time. The word samurai implies 'servant' and is strictly applicable only to retainers, but the costume arose applying it to the whole warrior class, who were in any case liegemen, direct or indirect, of the Shogun himself, the apex of the pyramid. Samurai carried two swords i.e. katana (daitou) the long swords and wakizashi (shotou) the shorter sword. The first recognition point for distinguishing a samurai, either in illustrations, or probably even at the time in the flesh, is the sight of two sword-handles protruding from the girdle on the left-hand side, where the right hand could come across and draw either. Because there are so many data about samurai, I insisted myself to make a special page for it. Just look forward it soon!

Seppuku (self-disembowelment)
A term of suicide which is more famous as harakiri. The procedure, in fact usually happened was that immediately the knife was plunged into the left side of the abdomen, and the cut made towards the center, the head was struck off by a blow from a kaishaku's sword, thus cutting short the death-agony. If you wan to know more about the details of seppuku, I suggest you to read Hara-Kiri: Japanese Ritual Suicide by Jack Seward, or Bushido: The Soul of Japan by Inazo Nitobe or Tales from Old Japan by A. B. Milford (Lord Redesdale), all published by Tuttle Publishing.

Tatami (straw mats)
Thick straw mats finished with woven grass, the standard flooring in houses of well-to-do. The rooms are divide from the corridors which run outside them by sliding screens (shouji), while the corridors are separated from the outside world by screens of wooden lattice covered with paper to let in light, with further heavy wooden screens, like shutters, that would be moved over at night and bad weather.

Tokugawa (shogun lineage)
Who's the man? Tokugawa! Yosh, it was Tokugawa Ieyasu who finally reunified Japan and then he and his successors governed the country in deep and lasting peace for over two centuries. There are a lot of epic about them, but I couldn't write it all down here. As the substitution, I will write the lineage of Tokugawa family as shown below:

Torii (gates)
A very typical gate that indicating the Shinto shrine. Its shape looks like a huge letter T with double horizontal lines. The torii is, for me personally, very beautiful. In Miyajima you can see an outer gate/torii set in the sea. Even Tuttle Publishing made it as their symbol.

Yoriki (assistant magistrate)
Each magistrate had immediately under him 25 yoriki or assistant magistrates. They too were samurai, who were employed in other department would normally receive personal appointments and not have hereditary entry into their positions. The yoriki have the reputation of having been very proud of their appearance, with hair kept very neat, and always wearing two swords, with hakama and haori.

Makoto's endnote: I know that there are many other glossaries, but because I'm lack of page-space, all I could write were these. If you find any difficult glossary, just ask me at makoto@inuyasha.nu. I'll do my best to help you ^_~.

Acknowledgments:
1. Dunn, C. J. Everyday Life in Traditional Japan: The Fourteenth Printing. Tuttle Publishing: Boston, Rutland, Vermont, Tokyo. 2000.
2. Mason, R. H. P. and J. G. Caiger. A History of Japan, Revised Edition: The Fourth Printing. Tuttle Publishing: Boston, Rutland, Vermont, Tokyo. 2001.