This female lady-in-waiting doll is part of a Hinamatsuri (Doll Festival or Girls' Day) set. She has a white composition face and black hair pulled back into long ponytail. Her hair falls down her back to the end of her trousers and is tied at the back of her neck and at intervals down the length of the ponytail. Her face has red parted lips and glass set-in eyes. Her composition arms are bent at the elbows and held in front of her body between waist and chest. She is wearing a white kimono top with long, wide, padded sleeves, and wide red trousers that are pleated in front and have a wide red sash with white stitching at the waist, covering a green brocade sash in front. There is a red sash tied to the doll's left arm. No feet are visible, but her red pants fold under to make a base. She is pictured with a small metal tea kettle, possibly meant to hold sake to serve to the emperor and empress. The kettle is embossed with floral and abstract images along the body and handle.
Hinamatsuri, the Doll Festival or Girls' Day, is held annually on March 3 to celebrate the happiness and health of young girls. The holiday originated during the Edo period (1600-1868) to ward off evil spirits, and at some Hinamasturi festivals today, people release paper dolls into the rivers to carry away sickness and bad fortune. Setting up a display of special festival dolls in the house is fundamental to the festival, and the display is usually put up in mid-February but put away as soon as the festival ends because of old superstitions. Hinamatsuri dolls wear Heian period (794-1192) clothing, and are placed in specific locations on a one-, five-, or seven-tiered platform covered with red felt (depending on the number of dolls owned). On the top tier, the emperor and empress dolls are placed in front of a miniature gold folding screen. The second tier holds the sannin kanjo, three ladies-in-waiting dolls, with takatsuki (round tables) holding sweets in between them. The gonin bayashi (five musicians) stand and sit on the third tier, playing a small taiko drum, a large otsuzumi drum, a kotsuzumi hand drum, or a yokobue (flute); the fifth musician is an utaika (singer). On the fourth tier are the daijin (court ministers): a young Minister of the Right and the older Minister of the Left, with a hishidai diamond-shaped table and a kakebanzen (covered-bowl table). The fifth tier features guards and/or servants amid a sakura (cherry) tree and an orange tree. The final two tiers hold an array of items, including: clothing chests (nagamochi and tansu), hibachi braziers, tea ceremony utensils, and carriages/palanquins, among others.
