Incense box set with Tale of Genji chapter crests

Traditionally incense was used for perfuming garments and personal items; however, it is the incense instruments made for ceremonial and recreational use that have survived in large numbers. A simple incense container often holds a small number of incense chips or rounded pellets for use on a single occasion such as a tea ceremony, but elaborate sets such as this one were used in incense-comparing games, in which players guess the scent and connect it to classical literature that the aroma is meant to refer to. The game was one of the three classical Japanese arts of refinement, along with the tea ceremony and flower arrangement.