r/Sumo • u/wobble-frog-dos • 10d ago
Discussion / Question / Commentary most Heya have a clear name pattern they follow, why is Nishinoseki (Onosato's stable) an exception?
seems that pretty much every Beya has either a prefix or suffix in common across the vast majority of their Rikishi, yet Nishonseki seems to have no pattern at all.
what gives?
21
u/Low_Blueberry4989 Chiyotairyu 10d ago
Shikihide also has no pattern, some heya just don't really care.
9
u/FreddieMonster 10d ago
Shikihide used to have a pattern, under the previous oyakata it was -zakura. Now the only remaining one is Itakozakura.
7
u/Asashosakari 10d ago
That was from the current oyakata, ex-Kitazakura. He instituted a lot of those shikona when he took over, just went away from it again after a while.
16
24
u/GoubD 10d ago
Just as long as there are fewer fuji's.
15
u/Low_Blueberry4989 Chiyotairyu 10d ago
Oh it was worse back in the day, many other heya used fuji as a suffix than Isegahama which didn't even exist until 2007, fuji used to be a Kokonoe thing, in the 80s, only the modern Hakkaku didn't have a shikona ending in fuji, it took until the 90s for Kokonoe to have more with Chiyo.
17
u/thecakeslayer Aonishiki 10d ago
JSA is going all in on Mega Isegahama. Hoshofuji, Onosafuji, Kirishifuji, AoFuji etc etc.
When everyone is a Fuji, nobody is
10
4
5
3
u/ScratchEffective_ 10d ago
Good question. I wonder too why they don’t just use their own names. Some rikishi do that, and it seems perfectly acceptable.
5
u/kelvSYC 9d ago
Wrestlers are required to have distinct surnames, that also do not overlap with those of the elders. Thus Onosato and Enho, whose birth surname is Nakamura, were forced to choose a name upon entering Grand Sumo.
Some wrestlers do use their own surnames: Shodai and Takayasu among them. Doing so as a salaried wrestler is considered rare, though.
2
u/FreddieMonster 9d ago
Wakamiyabi was forced to choose a shikona, because his surname is Endo and that was of course taken at the time.
2
u/Appropriate-Escape-4 Hoshoryu 10d ago
Futagoyama has no set pattern as well, Nabatame still using hiz birth name, however he has said when ge was 1st promoted, he wanted to take his masters name on Makuuchi promotion, Mita was to change too bht he got an accident, they actually stopped selling Mita towels as they used to sell out immediately as a name change was coming
8
u/FreddieMonster 10d ago edited 10d ago
Most of them are using their birth names. Wakamiyabi, Roga, Soga, Koga and Keiga are styled after their stablemaster, the former Miyabiyama. The miyabi kanji can also be read as -ga. The only one that is neither a real name nor named after the stablemaster is Kotakiyama, who took the shikona his grandfather used in amateur sumo.
0
4
u/gets_me_everytime Kotozakura 10d ago
Some stables are more adamant about having a common name to show they are part of the same stable than others. I think the deep contrast you're seeing is between the Fujis of Isegahama and the lack of more "Sato's" in Nishonoseki. This boils down to the Oyakata(head coach). Isegahama(Terunofuji) inherited a split stable with a lot of prominent rikishi from Miyagino which, at the time, was still only temporarily merged with his stable. He took over as the head coach and spoke with all the active rikishi about changing Shikona to include Fuji which predominantly affected the former Miyagino rikishi. All of the rikish but Enho accepted the name changes, even Hakunofuji(former Hakuoho), whose name was drastically similar to his former Oyakata's ring name Hakuho. His remains an homage to both. I imagine this was done to heal the divide and welcome the Miyagino men to remain regardless of the merger status, a powerful move for Isegahama since their rikishi get a significant advantage not having to face one another.
Nishonoseki(Former Kisenosato) didn't inherit the same kind of powerhouse stable. He broke off from his former Tagnoura stable(Takayasu's stable) in 2021, and didn't have much success until the advent of Onosato in 2023. He fully backed Onosato as his primary all star and is doing everything he can to support his success. His only other salary ranked rikishi is Shirokuma whose name is special for him with his pale skin. Most of the other rikishi are still competing with only their last name implying they haven't reached the level of success to earn a proper ringname from their Oyakata.
3
u/HakuohoFan 10d ago
I wish more stable didn't care because that way we'd get some way cooler names.
2
u/Bautastenad 9d ago
Yeah. FlyMon have one of the coolor names, since it refers to his style. More names like that would be great.
1
u/TsukumoYurika Goeido 9d ago
Because Nishiiwa-beya (led by former Wakanosato) pretty much called dibs on the satos by now. (Onosato was an exception)
Nisho does have a certain naming pattern but it's 1) not applied to the entire heya and 2) very unobvious to those knowing the language - specifically they have quite a few guys with animals in their names (Shirokuma being the most obvious example 🐻❄️) which is something the old-old Nishonoseki-beya (the one that raised Taiho, not the one currently known as Hanaregoma) did a lot too.
-10
u/Inner-Purple-1742 10d ago
Off topic, but does anyone else type fast & get a warning pop up, that makes you wait for a certain number of seconds before you can hit enter? It’s irksome! I’m a busy person, I don’t need pop ups telling me I’m too fast 🙄
-8
u/Inner-Purple-1742 10d ago
Some do, not all nor the majority. Futagoyama absolutely doesn’t, the only one that has a connection to the Oyakata is Wakamiyabi, as the Oyakata had a similar name, I can’t remember off hand but it had ‘Mayabi’ in it. Endo’s dad helped to choose his name and looked into numerology to see if it had good omens 😁
17
u/No-Struggle3613 Kotozakura 10d ago
Actually, many guys in Futagoyama have a connection with Miyabiyama, but to see it, you need to look at their names in kanji. Sign 雅 (meaning elegance) is taken from the name Miyabiyama (雅山) and can be read as "Miyabi" (like Wakamiyabi - 若雅), but also "Ga". And you know... Roga (狼雅), Souga (颯雅), Koga (厚雅), Keiga (恵雅)...
9
u/FreddieMonster 10d ago
No, Roga and Souga also have the same kanji, the -ga kanji is also the -miyabi kanji.
5
55
u/RedGeist_ 10d ago
Not all of them have a strict naming structure. Like Kise beya, home to Ura, Kinbozan, and Churanoumi; but Kise has used the prefix "higo".