Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (月岡芳年) (artist 04/30/1839 – 06/09/1892)
The temple acolyte Shiragikumaru (Tera koshō Shiragikumaru - 寺扈従白菊丸) wrestling with a green demon from the series Sagas of Beauty and Bravery (Biyū Suikoden - 美勇水滸伝)
10/1866
6.75 in x 9.25 in (Overall dimensions) Japanese woodblock print
Signed: Ikkaisai Yoshitoshi hitsu
一魁斎芳年筆
Publisher: Ōmiya Kyūjirō (Marks 415 - seal 30-034)
Combined date and aratame censor seal: 10/1866
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Marega Collection, Universita Pontificia Salesiana
National Gallery of Victoria
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston - a related Kuniyoshi print from the 100 Poets series
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston - a related Toyokuni III print of Shiragikumaru
Waseda University - another Toyokuni III print related to a story of Shiragikumaru
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Bibliothèque nationale de France - #34 in an album
Musée d’art et d’histoire, Ville de Genève
Seattle Asian Art Museum
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, München Shiragikumaru is the thing of legends. He was a beautiful boy serving as a page in a Buddhist temple. Loved by the priest Jikyū, he is also pursued by other monks. Jikyū and Shiragikumaru resolve to commit suicide by jumping into the sea off of Enoshima after exchanging the halves of an incense box. That way they will be able to identify each other in a future life. Shiragikumaru drowns, but Jikyū survives their love pact. Seventeen years later Jikyū, now called Seigen, is a high-ranking priest at another temple when Sakurahime, a beautiful young woman, comes to him seeking his assistance in helping her become a nun. She wants to be a nun because of a disgrace she has brought to her family. Seigen recognizes her as the reincarnation of his former young gay lover Shiragikumaru. He then falls in love with her.
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The text in the pink cartouche reads: 城州山崎戒光寺の児にて力人にすぐれしが 或夜坊中ニ鬼出て人を勅かせり 白ぎく見るより飛掛り鬼の角を掴む 鬼恐れて逃るはづみに角折て児の手ニ残ぬ
A loose translation using Google reads: "A boy from Yamazaki Kaikoji Temple in Joshu who was a talented wrestler. One night, a demon came out during a school ceremony and ordered someone to attack him. Rather than stare at the demon, he grabbed the demon's horn. Hazumi, who was afraid of the demon, ran away, the child broke the horn. There's nothing left."
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"The chūban prints from this series were printed two to a block and then cut... The production of the set lasted from 4/1866-4/1867. Once completed, it was issued with an unsigned, undated title page and a contents page that itemised all fifty prints, with the signature Ikkaisai Yoshitoshi ga (picture by Ikkaisai Yoshitoshi) and the name of Kanagaki Robun in the left margin."
Quoted from: Yoshitoshi: Masterpieces from the Ed Freis Collection, page 85. The authors note that there appears to be a later edition where the publisher's seal has been left blank.
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There are 8 other images from this series in the Lyon Collection (#s 404, 1076, 1103, 1155, 1156, 1157, 1188 and 1189), plus the frontispiece (#1191) and title page (#1190).
Ōmiya Kyūjirō (近江屋久次郎) (publisher)
Yūrei-zu (幽霊図 - ghosts demons monsters and spirits) (genre)
Suikoden (水滸傳) (genre)
Kanagaki Robun (仮名垣魯文) (author)