These brown horse hair brushes are stiffer than the white goat hair.

Japanese Sumi-e brushes. Like the Europeans, Japan has a 1000 year history of making beautiful handmade artists' brushes. This encompasses both the traditional Asian 'Zen' method of painting, as well as traditional woodblock printing in the Sumi-e tradition. Goat and sheep hair have special tapering cross-sections and are covered with miniature scales which pick up paint or ink in the "Jofuku" style (one dip). The Asian mountain horse or Samba is really a large Asian deer and produces a much stiffer fibre than the white goat/sheep brushes.

Hair diameter measurements are at the end of the ferrule position.