Historical enclosed seat carried by bearers, used for transporting people or, in funerary contexts, a corpse.
江戸時代、大名は輿に乗って移動した。
In the Edo period, feudal lords traveled by palanquin.
葬列では、遺体を乗せた輿がゆっくりと進
portable shrine
Used in festivals to carry a deity; more commonly called 神輿 (みこし) in modern Japanese.
祭りでは、若者たちが輿を担いで町を練り歩いた。
At the festival, young people carried the portable shrine through the town.
In the funeral procession, the bier carrying the body moved slowly.
輿 is the plain word for a palanquin, while 御輿 is the honorific form used for palanquins carrying deities or nobles.
Standard kanji spelling for this historical object.
The kanji 輿 depicts a vehicle carried by hands; the reading こし is native Japanese. The exact derivation is uncertain, but the word has been used since ancient times for a carried conveyance.