常在戦場 jōzai senjō Always on the Battlefield

Always on the Battlefield in Japanese is 常在戦場 which is read jōzai senjō

常在戦場 (jōzai senjō): always on the battlefield. Be as ready in peacetime as in war: that is the precept. At every witness for seventeen centuries it has meant the same thing, readiness in peace, kept by discipline of the body and plainness of life. It is said of peace, never of war for its own sake, and of what peace does to people who forget. The one time it was turned into Japanese, it became a poem. The poem says a warrior is one who keeps a heart that thinks, always and only, I am on the field of battle. A person who hangs it hangs a rule for the quiet years, and which battlefield is theirs.

Master Takase writes the four characters in block, semi-cursive and cursive script. She also writes them in her own font design. On the scroll, and on several of the designs, she writes 戦 in its older form 戰, the form the old books used.

The Japanese phrase jōzai senjō meaning "Always on the Battlefield" is composed of the word 常在 (read jōzai) meaning "always existing" and 戦場 (read senjō) meaning "battlefield".

The four characters are a clause from 陳壽's 三國志 (about 290), the historian's praise of 朱然's habit of readiness in peacetime; a samurai family, the 牧野, made them the first article of their house code by tradition in the sixteenth century, and the phrase became the creed of the domain they founded, 長岡, and the lifelong motto of the admiral born there, 山本五十六.

We want you to be as happy with the meaning as you are with Master Takase's art. To learn more, visit Philology of 常在戦場.

Your scroll is brushed when you order it and completed within 1 to 3 business days. It ships by USPS Priority Mail from Master Takase's studio in Washington State, boxed and ready to hang, with a printed page giving the art's English, romaji and Japanese.

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Every order is covered by our 30-day money-back guarantee. If your scroll arrives damaged, or we made an error, we replace it or refund you in full, including shipping. Refund policy

Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase brushes your scroll by hand when you order it. Each scroll bears her red seal, 英利, and her signature.

The scrolls are 12 1/4" W × 43" H (31 × 109 cm) with real silk borders and Japanese paper that are layered so the scroll hangs straight and will not warp over time. The scrolls themselves are made by Sankō (株式会社三幸) in Gifu prefecture, which has been making high quality scrolls since 1947, and we have worked with Sankō for over two decades.

Eri Takase was born and raised in Osaka, Japan, and holds the rank of Shihan, the highest rank in Japanese calligraphy, from the Bokuteki-kai and the Bunka-shodo. About Master Takase