A character in "The Tale of the Heike" and kabuki plays, Mongaku experienced a religious awakening at the age of 19, took vows and entered the life of a wandering ascetic. As an austerity, Mongaku prayed beneath the Nachi waterfalls, standing under...
legends (folk tales); men (male humans); mountains
A man in black robes with wind-blown hair and holding a staff evokes a storm as lightening flashes about him. Back to back print. As a scholar and poet Michizane (845-902) was the chief advisor to Emperor Uda (867-931, ruled 887-897) but was...
A man in ragged robes sits on the ground before a yellow-flowering bush watching sparrows flying above him. Sanekata was a poet and high-ranking nobleman of the Fujiwara clan. He died in exile in 994. Toward the end of his political career,...
A man in ragged robes sits on the ground before a yellow-flowering bush watching sparrows flying above him. Sanekata was a poet and high-ranking nobleman of the Fujiwara clan. He died in exile in 994. Toward the end of his political career,...
A sketch of two actors, Sakata Kintoki and Tsuchigumo in a play from the story of Raiko and the Earth Spider. In this tale, Raiko, while on a quest in search of a giant flying skull, found himself feeling ill and retired for the night. A servant...
A woman kneels with a lotus plant in her hand looking over at a snake rearing beside her; the woman wears a black nun's robe over her kimono and a large lotus leaf forms a halo around her head. The background of the print is delicately shaded from...
A woman with a large yellow and black umbrella (open) is accompanied by three white herons. The relationship of the animal kingdom to the world of human beings is close in rural societies. People feel a kinship with the wild creatures around them. ...
A woman, in a flower-covered red robe, dances, surrounded by small flames. Princess Yaegaki found herself in as difficult a situation as Romeo and Juliet, with whom this story from the play Honcho Nijushiko, or Twenty-four Examples of Filial Piety,...
A woman, in distress, is jumping in a river. The moon is setting and two white herons rise from the water near her. The story behind the image is: When her father lost his money and was jailed, Chikako tried to win his release. To prove herself a...
A woman, slightly bent over, grasps her hair at the river's edge. Kiyohime was the daughter of an innkeeper at the village of Masago. Anchin was a devout monk at Dojo Temple on the banks of the Hidaka river. Each year Anchin stayed at Kiyohime's...
legends (folk tales); men (male humans); armor (protective wear); Buddhas
An armored samurai is wrestling a red demon and multitude of skeletons under the gaze of a grinning yellow Buddha. Toki Motosada has seized the demon by the wrist and is throwing it down. Moths flutter around them under a full moon.
Where...
legends (folk tales); women; rivers; waterfalls (natural bodies of water)
An image of a woman sitting in the base of a waterfall, praying as the water falls around her. Tamiya Gempachiro, a fencing master from the Ikoma clan in Sanuki Province, was put to death in 1624 by a rival. His wife was pregnant and after his...
legends (folk tales); women; kimonos; lanterns; children (people by age group); fusuma; interior spaces; foxes (animals)
An image of a woman, with a fox's head (seen through a screen) walking through a door, leaving her child behind in the house. Foxes, or kitsune, are mysterious, magical creatures with powers many times greater than those of badgers. Sometimes...
legends (folk tales); robes (main garments); children (people by age group); boys; sandals
Back to back print. A man in a priest's robes and headdress cups the chin of a young boy standing beside him; a rosary dangles from his right wrist. The boy, dressed in traveling clothes, grasps the priest's wrist and lays his face in the man's...
Back to back print. A withered man in tattered robes, with a deadened look on his face, sits in a chair with a candle on his head; he is viewed with shock by a younger man.
In late 6th - early 7th centuries, Japan sent several embassies to China to...
legends (folk tales); men (male humans); caves; bats (animals)
Back to back print. Yoshitoshi here depicts an incident in which the 12th-century samurai Nitta Shirō Tadatsune discovered a mysterious cave on Mt. Fuji. While his companions were afraid to enter, the samurai seized a torch and entered the...
Beneath drying autumn grasses, the aged Komachi sits gazing at the moon. Ono no Komachi was a beautiful, intelligent woman and one of the most accomplished early court poets. As a young woman she was pursued by many suitors, most of whom she...
In a variation on the "Cat Monster of Saga" story, (see plates 34-35 for description of the kabuki play), the mother of Ryuzoji Matahichiro appears to be threatened by Nabeshima Naoshige (1538-1618), who took control of Saga Castle and its domain...
In China and Japan, the constellations Vega and Altair are called the Weaver Maiden and the Herdsman. Legend says that after Shokiyo, the Weaver Maiden, fell in love with and married Kengi, the Herdsman, she became distracted and failed in her duty...
legends (folk tales); men (male humans); robes (main garments);
In Japanese and Chinese legend eight magical cassia trees grow on the moon. Their red leaves in autumn are said to give the harvest moon its color. The trees' seeds bestow immortality and also give the power of invisibility to those who eat them....
