Menuki Id

[loiner1965]

is this ying and yang or is it anything else.

many thanks

[seattle1]

Hello:

 Well the comma-like device is surely a magatama, one of the Three Imperial Regalia of mythic times. The incorporation with what looks like an arrowhead is not clear; perhaps just two nice associations.

 Arnold F.

[Curran]

Determine first if Arnold is correct about the other part being an arrowhead.

 

When I saw it, the first thing I thought of was those archery tools used like an archer's thumb ring.

Though most that come up in a Google image search are rather fancy archery thumb rings, I seem to remember the 'ying' or 'yang' comma type was also an archery tool of some sort.

 

[as per my avatar, I have a longstanding interest in archery. It is part of how I ended up in Japan in the late 1980s].

[PhoenixDude]

2nded. Magatama and arrowhead/yari

[Tanto54]

Dear Steve,

 

I believe that this menuki represents Amenonuhoko (the jeweled spear from the Shinto creation myth) used by Izanagi-nokami and Izanami-nokami.  They were brother & sister and later husband & wife Shinto deities who used Amenonukoko to stir the seas in order to create and consolidate the land mass of Japan.  Their union also created many of the other famous gods like Ebisu.  The combination of a Magatama and a Yari in Japanese art would be used for that representation.

[loiner1965]

many thanks gentlemen.

i bought this on the spur of the moment and awaiting its arrival , i can provide more details then