On the second floor of a Western-style building, probably the famous Rokumeikan, Japanese couples appear to be taking dancing lessons, accompanied by two pianists. The young people seem awkward in movement and intent in their expressions,...
women; children (people by age group); bats (animals); trees; built works; bridges (built works)
As three bats / komori circle in the evening sky, two boys try to touch them with bamboo sticks while their mother and baby brother look on. Bats have long been a symbol of good luck in Northeast Asia because the words in Chinese for "bat" and for...
women; courtesans; men (male humans); children (people by age group); snow (precipitation); swords; trees; hats; sandals; Built complexes and districts
The Yoshiwara courtesan Urazato had a child by Tokijiro, but the Yamana-ya brothel owner forbid Urazato from seeing her lover, according to the kabuki play Akegarasu Hana no Nureginu. On a snowy evening, Urazato goes into the garden to meet...
Six women prepare for an evening concert. To the left, a woman brings in a tall candlestick to add to another already lighting the scene, while beside her a woman in green sits holding a cup. In the center panel an attendant bring in an ichigenkin,...
men (male humans); flowers; swords; kimonos; boats; flowers (plants)
The young woman Miyuki met Miyagi one evening; she gave him a fan with morning glory flowers asagao, and he composed a poem for her about the blossoms, according to the Asagao nikki. In the morning they parted, although their boats passed at...
men (male humans); women; kimonos; books; axes (tools)
According the Konjaku monogatari, a devout young woman valued all sentient beings, and bought some live crabs at a market to set them free. Later when her father saw a snake about to eat a frog, he asked the snake to give up his meal in return for...
An older woman with shaved eyebrows, indicating her married status, is nicely but conservatively dressed. Her plaid inner robe is typical of late Edo Period fashions in the city of Edo, often influenced by kabuki stage costume textiles. She might...
women; men (male humans); kimonos; fans (costume accessories); snow (precipitation); trees; flowers (plants); hats; hair ornaments; hairstyles; built works
In 1338 the daughter of the governor of Iga Province went with her mother to the imperial palace in Kyoto, accompanied by the courtier Hino Suketoshi. One evening at a banquet for moon viewing, Suketoshi mistook Lady Nii's wine cup for his own, and...
The famous warrior Minamoto no Yoshiie (1041-1108) was sent to the north of Japan to regain control for the imperial court of lands taken by the Abe clan. While negotiating with Abe no Muneto one rainy evening, the house was attacked, but the...
women; kimonos; Single Built Works; agricultural land; teakettles; tables (support furniture); stoves (heating equipment)
Several tourists are enjoying the interesting phenomenon of the moon being reflected on the water surface of flooded rice fields in Shinano Province (Nagano Prefecture). This famous view was well-known to travelers and even illustrated by Hiroshige...
women; children (people by age group); kimonos; sandals; hairstyles; fences
As evening begins to fall, four children are playing outside a fenced compound by casting shadows in the moonlight. The pudgy boy in a light-weight cotton robe / yukata seems almost surprised by his hand shape on the ground. While his two older...
The medieval warrior Mori Rikimaru stands with his bloodied spear and two severed heads slung around his neck as trophies. On May 15, 1868 two thousand troops loyal to the shogunate fought a desperate battle at Ueno, in Edo, near the tombs of some...
men (male humans); women; Japanese maple; kimonos; mountains; trees; biwa
Fujiwara no Moronaga (1137-1192) was famous as a lute or biwa musician but unfortunate in his political career, as he kept running afoul of Taira no Kiyomori, who first exiled him in 1165 to Kyushu for 8 years and then in 1179 to Owari Province...
Lord Sadanobu was a minister at the Heian court in the first half of the tenth century. The 13th-century book Okagami tells the story of how one evening, as he was hurrying to a meeting at the imperial palace, he felt something grab the end of his...
Lord Sadanobu was a minister at the Heian court in the first half of the tenth century. The 13th-century book Okagami tells the story of how one evening, as he was hurrying to a meeting at the imperial palace, he felt something grab the end of his...
banners; parasols; flowers (plants); baskets; women; men (male humans); kimonos; processions; floats (vehicles); Built complexes and districts
This set of small deluxe prints revisited many of the subjects and themes Chikanobu had depicted in earlier and larger formats. But where the "Chiyoda Inner Palace" or Chiyoda Ooku series of triptychs portrayed the shogun's private quarters where...
folk tales; women; kimonos; grasses (plants); birds (animals)
Tamamo no mae was the beautiful and learned concubine of the Emperor Toba. One evening during a banquet, the wind rose and the lights went out, and the emperor became ill. The court magician declared this the sorcerous work of the concubine, who...
An image of monsters coming out of a basket, threatening an old man. An old man and an old woman were neighbors. Every evening the old man fed a sparrow that visited him. When he returned home one day he was disturbed not to see the sparrow and...
An image of a beautiful woman and an old crone with a lamp made of peony flowers. The Peony Lantern is a ghostly romance adapted from an old Chinese tale by the novelist Encho in 1884. The chilling story was extremely popular and was dramatized...
