🇯🇵 Japan · Traditional
Anmaあん摩按摩（あんま）
A manual practice carried forward in Japan with historical connections to Chinese anmo. It combines kneading, stroking and pressure, often over clothing. The contributions of practitioners with visual impairments are an important part of its history.
Fact sheet
- Origin
- 🇯🇵 Japan · 🇨🇳 China — Japan (Kyoto, Edo), with roots in China
- Era
- Arrived in the Nara period; systematised in the Edo period（Traditional）
- Classification
- Traditional massage
- Direction
- Centrifugal (heart to periphery), the opposite of Western massage's centripetal direction
- Basic techniques
- Stroking, kneading, pressing, vibration, percussion and movement (including kyokute)
- Classic texts
- Fujibayashi Ryohaku, 'Anma Tebiki' (1799) and Ota Shinsai, 'Anpuku Zukai' (1827), late-Edo illustrated manuals of anma and abdominal anma
- Who practised it
- Monopolised by the blind guild (Todoza) in the Edo period; still an important profession for visually impaired people
- Techniques
- Pressure / Percussion
- Practitioner body parts
- Thumb / Palm / Fist
- Medium
- None
- Clothing
- Clothed
- Setting
- Mat
- Typical duration
- 30–60 min
- Also known as
- Amma · Japanese anma massage · 按摩
History: from China to Japan, into the hands of the blind
In classical Chinese medicine 'anmo' combines an (to press) and mo (to rub), and the name appears from the era of the Huangdi Neijing. It reached Japan in the Nara period together with the system of Chinese medicine, and the state medical bureau of the ritsuryo administration created posts for anma. From then on anma was handed down among monks and physicians as the manual branch of East Asian medicine alongside acupuncture and moxibustion.
In the Edo period anma became an institutionalised profession for the blind. The blind acupuncturist Sugiyama Waichi (1610–1694) invented the guide-tube needling method, won shogunal patronage and organised schools for the blind; acupuncture and anma became the reserved trade of the Todoza, the blind practitioners' guild. In this era kneading, percussion and the abdominal treatment anpuku were refined, and illustrated manuals such as Fujibayashi Ryohaku's 'Anma Tebiki' (1799) and Ota Shinsai's 'Anpuku Zukai' (1827) appeared.
The Meiji restoration abolished the Todoza and placed Western medicine at the centre of the system. Anma was demoted from medicine to comfort, but a 1947 law made it a national licence, and it remains an important profession for visually impaired people.
Theory: centrifugal direction and the meridians
Anma uses terms for stroking, kneading, pressure, vibration, percussion and movement. Accounts describe contact over clothing and kneading, but direction and sequence vary across teaching traditions.
Concepts such as meridians are presented within their traditional explanatory context. We do not assign spirituality to one geographic group and science to another.
Understanding touch also means listening to how practitioners learn and how they communicate with the person receiving care.
Development: shiatsu and popularisation
In the first half of the 20th century a technique that took anma's pressing method and re-explained it through Western anatomy and physiology became independent as shiatsu. Anma remained the broad system including kneading and percussion; shiatsu became the pressure-specialised one, and the two were legally distinguished in 1964.
In the 1990s 'quick massage', clothed sessions of 10 to 30 minutes on a chair or table, spread rapidly through Japanese cities. Most of its techniques come from anma and shiatsu; it is the commercialisation of Japan's 'shoulder-kneading' culture. Around the same time David Palmer in the United States developed chair massage out of his study of anma, making anma the source of the 'clothed, short' format both inside and outside Japan.
In the national licence curriculum anma is studied with shiatsu and massage over three or more years, covering anatomy, physiology, the outline of East Asian medicine and clinical practice. Protection of the profession for visually impaired people, including limits on new training schools, remains a feature of the Japanese system.
Anma today
Anma is practised today in treatment rooms, in hospitals and care homes, and as home-visit massage. For chronic shoulder and back pain, post-operative care and prevention of disuse in older people, it can be covered by health insurance with a physician's consent.
A session of 30 to 60 minutes centres on kneading and percussion, clothed, seated or lying. The Japanese sense of 'being kneaded' comes from anma. Abroad it is introduced as 'Amma', mainly as a clothed, oil-free Eastern massage.
Contraindications follow those of manual therapy generally: acute inflammation, fractures, skin disease, tumour sites and serious cardiovascular disease. Percussion avoids bony prominences and the kidney area.
Signature moves
Descriptions introduce ways of touch, not instructions to reproduce them. Practice varies by lineage, practitioner and recipient.
Kneading (junetsu-ho)
Grasping muscle with thumb or palm and kneading in circles; the protagonist of anma.
Kyokute (rhythmic percussion)
Rhythmic tapping with the hand edge, fist or cupped palms; a showpiece with its own sound.
Pressing
Sustained pressing with thumb or palm; the technique from which shiatsu grew.
Anpuku (abdominal anma)
Kneading of the abdomen to regulate the internal organs.
Movement techniques
Passive movement of joints to restore range of motion.
One possible session
An example centred on conversation and consent—not a prescribed sequence, duration or self-treatment guide.
Seated: shoulders and neck first
From stroking into kneading; the familiar Japanese 'shoulder rub'.
Back and lower back
Kneading and pressing down either side of the spine.
Out to the limbs (centrifugal)
From shoulder to fingertips, from hip to toes.
Close with percussion
Kyokute on the back and legs for a refreshed finish.
Related competition categories
Competition scores assess a performance under that event’s rules—not the value of a technique or culture. Consult the official rules for eligibility and judging criteria.
Related forms and lineages
Frequently asked questions
Q.What is the difference between anma, shiatsu and massage?
Some movements overlap, but educational, naming and practice contexts differ. Direction or clothing alone does not define a strict boundary. Ask about a practitioner’s training and scope, and consult current official information about qualifications.
Q.Why was it a profession for the blind?
The Edo shogunate protected acupuncture and anma as a trade for the blind following Sugiyama Waichi's achievements. It suited blind practitioners' refined sense of touch, and the Todoza guild managed training and practice. The profession is still protected for visually impaired people today.
Q.What is 'kyokute'?
The name for anma's percussion techniques performed rhythmically with the hand edge, fist or cupped hands. Its sound and rhythm are distinctive and it is often used to close a session.
Glossary
- 遠心性Enshinsei
- Direction from the body's centre to the periphery; the anma principle.
- 曲手Kyokute
- The group of rhythmic percussion techniques.
- 按腹Anpuku
- Abdominal anma.
- 当道座Todoza
- The Edo-period guild of blind practitioners who held acupuncture and anma as their trade.
Sources & references
This article draws on the following primary sources, official bodies, scholarship and organisations.
- [1]厚生労働省 — あん摩マツサージ指圧師、はり師、きゆう師等に関する法律Official body
- [2]太田晋斎『按腹図解』（1827 年）／藤林良伯『按摩手引』（1799 年）Primary source
- [3]公益社団法人 日本あん摩マッサージ指圧師会Organisation
- [4]杉山検校遺徳顕彰会（杉山和一に関する資料）Organisation
About this article
Edited from published sources. Listing sources does not mean community or specialist review is complete, or that benefits are established. We welcome practitioners’ perspectives on names, descriptions, additions and corrections.
Share a perspective or correction- Edited by
- Massage Championship World Tour
- Last updated
Technique-specific visuals require content, source and usage review before publication. Generated illustrations must be labelled as illustrative, never presented as documentary photographs of people, interviews or practice.
Related techniques
Japan
Facial Massage and Kobido
フェイシャルマッサージと古美道古美道（こびどう）
Kobido is a name and system associated with Japanese facial manual work, including descriptions of quick finger movements and kneading. It is not a synonym for all facial massage; lineage accounts and use of the name require individual verification.
Face · Head · Lymph
Traditional massageBeauty massageView →Japan
Ampuku
按腹（あんぷく）按腹
Abdomen · Pressure
Traditional massageView →Japan
Shiatsu
指圧指圧（しあつ）
A practice developed in Japan using pressure with fingers, palms and other forms of contact, often over clothing. Namikoshi and Masunaga traditions illustrate differences in teaching and understandings of the body; no single intensity or benefit defines them all.
Pressure · Stretch
Traditional massageClinical massageView →