Ehon fujibakama 絵本ふちはかま

FSC-GR-780.788.1-2

Commentary by Iwakiri Yuriko

Posted April 19, 2017
Original unedited text in Japanese follows

Ehon fujibakama (A picture book of thoroughwort) is a collection of tales illustrating the wise and virtuous women of legend and history from ancient to modern times. In his preface the gesaku author Kōzan no Shōfu (Saeda Shigeru; 1741–1832) states that the ukiyo-e artist Jūzan designed these illustrations in order to educate his daughter. The publishers Kadomaruya Jinsuke 角丸屋甚助 and Kadomaruya Tokusaburō 角丸屋徳三郎 (Shūseikaku 衆生閣) then secured them for publication, and asked Kōzan to write about the women portrayed. The work was first issued in 1823 (Bunsei 6). Shūseikaku issued the majority of Kōzan’s gesaku. The colophon lists the artist’s name as Yanagawa Jūzan (柳川重山画). In 1833 Jūzan received the art name Shigenobu重信II from his teacher Yanagawa Shigenobu I (1787–1832) and became the second generation head of the lineage.

Together, the two volumes contain fifteen illustrations of women. The female figures Ōiko (大井子) of Takashima and Kaneko (金子) of Ōmi depicted in the first volume (fifth and seventh double-page illustrations; pp. 18–19 and 26–27 on the website, respectively) are also featured as mighty women in chapter ten of the Kamakura-period Kokon chomonjū 古今著聞集 (A collection of things written and heard in the past and present). They also appear in the ninth volume of Katsushika Hokusai’s Hokusai manga (FSC-GR-780.233.1-14; 1819), and it is possible that Jūzan drew inspiration from this work.

The names of the publishers Kadomaruya Jinsuke and Kadomaruya Tokusaburō do not appear in the Pulverer copy, which is a later printing from 1836 (Tenpō 7) by Izumiya Ichibē (Kansendō甘泉堂). The colophon of the first printing lists Miyata Yoshiya宮田吉哉as the block-cutter; the Pulverer copy does not include his name. The Pulverer reprint utilizes the then recently imported pigment Prussian blue (bero-ai ベロ藍) instead of the dayflower blue (ai) colorant. The Pulverer copy is an early printing among known later printings.

書名絵本ふちはかま

執筆者岩切友里子

古今の賢女烈婦の話を集めた絵本。絳山樵夫の序文によれば、衆生閣の主人が絵師の重山が娘への教えのために描いたものを見て出版しようと入手し、絳山に絵の故実を記

すように求めたという。巻末の刊記には「柳川重山画」とあるが、重山は1833年に重信の名を継いで、二代重信と改名した。絳山樵夫は戯作者、小枝繁の別名で、彼の戯作は角丸屋甚助（衆星閣）の出版になるものが多い。

上巻の「大井子」「金子」は、ともに『古今著聞集』巻十にその説話が記されている力

持ちの女性たちであるが、『北斎漫画』九編（1819刊）にも採り上げられており、重山

がこれに画想を得た可能性がある。

文政６年（1823）刊の初版の版元は、角丸屋甚助・徳三郎で、天保７年（1836）求板

のFSC-GR-780.788.1-2にはないが、初版の奥付には彫師、宮田吉哉の名が記されて

いる。求板本では、用いられている藍がベロ藍に変わっている。

Copies in other collections:

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
National Diet Library, Tokyo

Tokyo National Museum