【Reading】てっかば

【English Name】Tekkaba

Tekkaba refers to a place where gambling is held. In addition to being used as another name for "toba" (gambling den), it is also called "bonnaka," "bon," "ba," "shiki," and the like.

Particularly well known in relation to sushi is the aspect concerning the origin of the name of the tekka-maki. The tekka-maki is said to have been born in the tekkaba as a food that could be easily picked up with one hand even in the midst of gambling. This theory of origin resonates with the anecdote that the Earl of Sandwich in England had ingredients placed between bread so that he could eat without stopping his card game, and because of its intelligibility it has been widely accepted.

In Edo-period Japan, gambling was prohibited, so gambling dens were constantly subject to crackdowns. To avoid that risk, they were sometimes held within the precincts of temples and shrines or inside the residences of court nobles, beyond the reach of the town magistrate's control. Although meals were sometimes served at gambling dens, blue-backed fish such as sardine, saury, and mackerel, as well as dishes using chicken and long onion, were shunned as inauspicious ingredients.

The word "tekka" (iron-fire) itself carries the connotation of a white-hot arena of contest, like red-hot iron. In the modern era it survives as slang indicating a gambling venue, while also leaving its traces within sushi terms such as tekka-maki and tekka-don.