Jigai

the wife of Onodera Junai, one of the Forty-seven Ronin, prepares for her suicide.

Jigai was a traditional method of ritual suicide for women in Japan. Although the term literally means "self damage" and in principle can refer to suicide in general, in practice it normally refers to the ritual suicide of women by the cutting of the jugular vein with a short sword or dagger.

Unlike the male version called seppuku, there were no seconds in the execution of this event. Since the severing of the jugular vein brought rapid death there was no need for beheading to prevent the person from suffering.

Jigai is the female equivalent of Seppuku or hara-kiri, the ritual stomach-cutting suicide practiced by Japanese men. Before committing jigai, a woman would often tie her ankles together so her body would be found in a dignified pose, despite the convulsions of death. The act was often done to preserve one's honor if a military defeat was imminent, i.e. to prevent rape.

[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.

A character of Madama Butterfly performs jigai.

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.