National Treasures & Important Cultural Properties
of National Institutes for Cultural Heritage, Japan

These four items are all rush matting that are the same as those used for tatami matting. The three items from the item number one to the number three consist of one mat of woven rushes and the number four consists of two mats that are made by finely woven rushes and coarsely woven rushes. The mesh sizes for the number two and the number three are around 2.1 cm and 1.2 cm and the top part and the bottom part of the number four are around 1.5 cm and 1.2 cm, respectively. In terms of the number one, both ends are 1.8 cm, but the center part becomes rather wider. In addition, the number of rushes within 1 cm for the number one to the number three is 8, 7 and 9 respectively and for the top part and the bottom part of the number four are 11 and 7 respectively. On average, it is around 8 rushes, but as relatively fine rushes are used for the top part of the number four, you can see the good quality by merely looking at it. Two mats consisting of the number four used to be put together by tying the four corners with thin strings (around 0.6 cm in diameter), but the string for one part has been lost. It seems they either used to be used as mats with the edges or the core part of large mats such as "Oumu Monroukechitandai (N-29)." In any case, as these rush mats are about the same as current ones, the details have remained mostly unchanged since the Nara period.