Shino School (Tea Ceremony and Traditional Incense-smelling Ceremony) (志野流)
The Shino school is one of the schools of Kodo (traditional incense-smelling ceremony) and tea ceremony.
The Shino family
Soshin SHINO, the first-generation head of the family, was a trusted vassal who devoted himself to the Ashikaga shogun family, through the sixth shogun, Yoshinori ASHIKAGA to the eighth, Yoshiie ASHIKAGA. Shoha SINO, the third-generation head of the family, had a lot of pupils including SEN no Rikyu and retiring from his position, he left everything to Ryusho TATEBE; thus under the recommendation of Ryusho TATEBE, Sogo HACHIYA is said to have succeeded to the Shino school. On the other hand, some schools were independent of the Hachiya family, such as Johaku YONEKAWA, a founder of the Yonekawa school, following the style of Ryusho TATEBE, and those are sometimes known as the Takebe school.
History of the Shino family
The Hachiya family
As above mentioned, the Shino school was succeeded to by Sogo HACHIYA; however, it is sometimes referred to as the Hachiya school in contrast with the Takebe school. Sosen, the ninth tea master of the Shino school, established the iemoto system (the system of licensing the teaching of a traditional Japanese art), catching the tide of the Genroku era (the period when culture, especially among chonin [townspeople] flowered), therefore he was called as the restorer of the Shino school. Masaaki Sensai FUJIMO(1701-1783), a high-ranked disciple of Sosen, overcame the difficulty of the Shino family's succession for forty years, acting as a guardian for four-subsequent-generation heads of the school after the death of Sosen. During the time of the fifteenth master, Soi, the residence of the Shino family burned to the ground as a result of a fire caused by Kinmon Incident in 1864, and they moved to Nagoya under the wing of the Owari family. Until then, both the incense-smelling ceremony and the tea ceremony of the Shino school had been passed on as a unit, but the original tea ceremony of the Shino school performed by the Hachiya family has been discontinued since that time. The incense-smelling ceremony declined after the Meiji Restoration just like other public entertainments, but after the World War II, it made a comeback and now there are two branches; the Shino school and the Oie school. Although the art of the tea ceremony of the Shino school has been taught again since the Meiji period, it is said to be different from the original one.
History of the Hachiya family
The Shino school of tea ceremony
On the other hand, the original tea ceremony style of the Shino school was passed on in the Inaba region because Nakamasa IKEDA, the lord of the Tottori Higashi Yakata, which was the branch domain of Tottori, preferred the style of the Shino school of the tea ceremony, built the statue of its founder, and let 大谷平奉弘 teach that style as sado (a person in charge of the tea ceremony). In the Inaba region, the decision as to who inherits the statue of the founder is left the school's membership council.
History of the Shino school of tea ceremony