Hyōbanki were compilations of rankings and critiques of kabuki

Kabuki

is classical Japanese dance-drama. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate make-up worn by some of its performers.The individual kanji characters, from left to right, mean sing , dance , and skill...

 actors and courtesans

Oiran

were courtesans in Japan. The oiran were considered a type of "woman of pleasure" or prostitute. However, they are distinguished from the yūjo in that they were entertainers, and many became celebrities of their times outside the pleasure districts...

 published in Edo period

Edo period

The , or , is a division of Japanese history which was ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family, running from 1603 to 1868. The political entity of this period was the Tokugawa shogunate....

 Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

. They were generally published at the new year

New Year

The New Year is the day that marks the time of the beginning of a new calendar year, and is the day on which the year count of the specific calendar used is incremented. For many cultures, the event is celebrated in some manner....

 in Edo

Edo

, also romanized as Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of the Japanese capital Tokyo, and was the seat of power for the Tokugawa shogunate which ruled Japan from 1603 to 1868...

 and Kamigata

Kamigata

Kamigata is a region of Japan referring to the cities of Kyoto and Osaka; the term is used particularly when discussing elements of Edo period urban culture such as ukiyo-e and kabuki, and when making a comparison to the urban culture of the Edo/Tokyo region.Kabuki, ukiyo-e, and many of the other...

, reviewing and ranking the courtesans and actors of the previous year. Along with ukiyo-e

Ukiyo-e

' is a genre of Japanese woodblock prints and paintings produced between the 17th and the 20th centuries, featuring motifs of landscapes, tales from history, the theatre, and pleasure quarters...

woodblock prints and other publications, hyōbanki were important elements in the urban popular culture of the period.

Actor hyōbanki

A book called yarō hyōbanki was published in 1656, though many scholars consider the 1687 yakusha hyōbanki to be the first in the form. These were published regularly until 1890.

Actors were ranked according to a fairly simple scale:

• Jō-jō-kichi (上々吉)　Upper-upper-excellent
• Jō-jō (上々) Upper-upper
• Jō (上) Upper
• Naka no jō-jō (中の上々) Upper-upper of the Middle
• Naka no jō (中の上) Upper of the Middle
• Naka (中) Middle

In print, variations were used to represent intermediate ranks between Jō-jō and Jō-jō-kichi. Sometimes only parts of the kanji

Kanji

Kanji are the adopted logographic Chinese characters hanzi that are used in the modern Japanese writing system along with hiragana , katakana , Indo Arabic numerals, and the occasional use of the Latin alphabet...

(character) for "kichi" (吉) would be written in, each stroke towards completing the character representing an intermediate rank. Other times, strokes would be written in outline instead of ink-filled, to represent intermediate rankings not yet achieved.

At times, ranks above jō-jō-kichi were added, to describe and rank the greatest kabuki actors.

• Dai-shigoku-jō-jō-kichi (大至極上々吉) Great exceedingly upper-upper-excellent
• Kō-goku-jō-jō-kichi (高極上々吉) Higher very upper-upper-excellent
• Shigoku-jō-jō-kichi (至極上々吉) Exceedingly upper-upper-excellent
• Goku-jō-jō-kichi (極上々吉) Very upper-upper-excellent
• Kō-jō-jō-kichi (高上々吉) Higher upper-upper-excellent
• Dai-jō-jō-kichi (大上々吉) Great upper-upper-excellent
• Shi-jō-jō-kichi (至上々吉) Climax of upper-upper-excellent