十八番

The Kabuki Jūhachiban ("Eighteen Best Plays") are the signature repertoire of the Ichikawa Sōke, said to have been selected by Danjūrō VII in the Tenpō era (1830s–40s). The list centres on aragoto triumphs handed down since Danjūrō I, including Kanjinchō, Shibaraku, Sukeroku, and Narukami.

Some of the eighteen were born after the list itself. The prime example is Kanjinchō, a boldly new dance drama drawing on the Noh play Ataka, first performed by Danjūrō VII himself in 1840. Today it is among the most frequently staged of all the Jūhachiban, its taut duel of wits between Benkei and the barrier keeper Togashi as gripping as ever.

Because the family is said to have treasured these plays as if sealed in a box (hako), the word ohako—written with the same characters as jūhachiban—came to mean "one's speciality" in everyday Japanese, and it is still in daily use today.