Kidai Shoran Scroll

The Kidai Shoran Scroll is a picture scroll depicting the Nihonbashi area of Edo. It was painted in 1805, artist unknown. Dimensions are 43.7 cm H 1,232.2 cm L. It depicts in exacting detail the shopping street of Nihonbashi Avenue and the throngs of people crowding the street.

It was discovered in 1999 in the Museum of Asian Art, Berlin and is an important cultural asset for understanding the street-life of Edo during the reign of Tokugawa Ienari, the 11th Shogun, who controlled the government for 50 years.

Area depicted

The scroll is an aerial view of Nihonbashi Street from Nihonbashi Bridge to Kanda Imagawa Bridge. It presents a 764 metre stretch of busy shopping precinct. The Nihonbashi Bridge crosses the Nihonbashi River. The Kanda Imagawa Bridge exists in name only today as the name of a street crossing. The Ryukan River which the bridge crossed has been filled in and is a narrow laneway today. This section of Nihonbashi Street today is commonly referred to as Chuo Dori or Central Avenue. It is the start of the Nakasendo Way. In the Edo Period (1603-1868) it was referred to as Tooricho or Toori Juni-ken. Today the street is a business district lined with offices of major corporations including the Mitsui Group. During the Edo Period the street was was brimming with wholesale stores and was the city’s major shopping precinct.

The city blocks covered from the right of the scroll, that is from the North, are as follows:

Nihonbashi Honshirogane-cho 2-chome (Toori Honshirogane-cho)

Nihonbashi Hongoku-cho 2 chome (Toori Koku-cho)

Hongoku-cho Jikken-dana (Jikken-dana)

Nihonbashi Muromachi 3-chome, 2-chome, and 1-chome

The names in parenthesis are the common names for the areas during the Edo Period when the street was known as “Toori” (“the street”), an indication of its central position in the city of Edo. The name Central Avenue today has a similar tone.

The area was reorganised and renamed in the early Showa Period (1930s) and today the scroll represents the four large city blocks of Nihonbashi Muromachi 1-4 chome.

Shops

The scroll depicts 88 wholesale stores called “Tonya” or “Toiya” (問屋). The exterior “Noren” curtains all have trademarks and trading names inscribed in legible script and form an accurate list of shop operators of the time. In the “Edo Kaimono Hitori Annai” (Edo Shopping Guide) of February 1824 one quarter of the stores represented in the scroll are listed in the Guide. However, their addresses are often different indicating the dynamic nature of conducting business in the early 1800s in Edo.

The outside views of the various merchant “machiya” townhouses are detailed with attention given to the type of eaves on the building, and the variations in the earthen warehouses and their white plaster walls. Unlike a similar scroll, the “Edo Fuuzoku Zukan” (18th century by Miyagawa Choshun, Important Cultural Property), where interiors of shops are depicted with a “seeing through” viewpoint, the shops of the Kidai Shoran are depicted in a realistic manner. Another feature is the accurate depiction of side alleys and the back-alley shops that lined them.

A number of famous shops appear in the scroll including the dry goods store Echigoya which remains in operation today as Mitsukoshi Department Store. The Echigoya head store operated in Suruga-cho. The store was, and remains, a large presence on the street and is depicted in extensive detail. Its affiliated stores and warehouses also appear in the surrounding area. The knife store “Kiya” which still operates in Muromachi is depicted as four stores in Muromachi 2-chome. Of the four Kiya stores depicted, Kooshichi’s store is closed for renovations with a poster stating that “during the construction period business will be conducted from the warehouse”. The large book store Suhara-ya still operates as a chain of stores today and is represented by two stores operated by Zengoro and Ichibee. This represents an Edo period practice of allowing senior employees to establish branches of the store under the same brand, and is the reason for Suhara-ya’s wide network today.

Apart from the official stores, there are a number of unofficial guard houses responsible for fire-watch and safety which supplement their income with shop activities often selling fire-fighting related products.

People

A total of 1,671 people are represented in the scroll, of whom 200 are women. This imbalance in the representation of sexes is worth noting.

The crowd is heavier towards Nihonbashi which reflects reality. Apart from people out shopping, there are hawkers, fortune-tellers, news cryers, street salesmen, Buddhist pilgrims, priests seeking temple donations, a child on his way to school, and many others.

Alongside the humans are 20 dogs, 13 horses, 4 ox with carts, one performing monkey, and 2 falcons on falconer’s arms.

Era:

It is thought the scroll dates to 1805 because a priest accompanied by pilgrims depicted soliciting temple donations is holding a donations box with “Bunka 2, Ekoin” written on it. The second year of the Bunka era is 1805. The Nihonbashi neighbourhood was completely destroyed in the great fire of 4 March 1806. The placement of stores in the scroll accords with the pre-fire arrangement. The season is likely to be early Spring as the famous Dolls market is set up in the Jikken-dana area. These Hina-dolls were sold from late February to early March. However, other observers note the sale of Bonito and children swimming in the Nihonbashi River, and suggest the scroll does not describe a particular season. The calligrapher Sano Toushu is responsible for the title of the scroll. Toushu died on 10 March 1814 therefore, the scroll precedes this date.

Artist:

The artist of the scroll is unknown. Two red seals on the title page indicate the calligraphy of the title page is by Sano Toushu. One seal says “Sajun-no-in” (Sajun’s seal) and the other says “Toshu”. We know that Sajun refers to Toushu because a carving (“hengaku”) of his calligraphy of the characters “Sanno Daigongen” donated to the Hiei Shrine says it is donated by Sano Sajun.

There are no markings on the scroll which indicate who the artist was.

In the early Bunka era Sano Toushu adopted the fiction writer (dime novelist) Santo Kyozan. Kyozan’s brother was the artist Santo Kyoden who was also known as Kitao Masanobu. And so the general view is that Santo Kyoden may be the artist.

A second theory held by Asano Shugo (Japanese art historian, b. 1950) uses a process of elimination examining the style and era of creation to suggest the artist may be Katsukawa Shun’ei (1762-1819).

Both theories remain a matter for speculation.

The title of the scroll includes the letter “Ten” (heaven) below the four main title characters, and therefore the scroll is thought to be part of a diptych or triptych. It is was a diptych the second work would have the character for “Chi” (earth) on it. If a triptych, then the three characters would be “Ten” “Chi” and “Jin” (people). The existence of the other one or two scrolls is unknown and a request for their whereabouts has been issued by the Museum of Asian Art in Berlin.

The other scroll may be of the Western side of the same stretch of shopping street. Or perhaps the Southern side of the Nihonbashi Bridge. Or of the crossroad Honcho Avenue. Or perhaps of a completely separate famous areas of Edo such as the shops lining the Sumida River, or the streets of the courtesan district at Yoshiwara. The discovery of the scroll(s) would be an important development in the understanding of the street life of Edo.

Reason for commissioning:

There is no artist’s signature nor record about the reason for commissioning the work. The work was likely commissioned by a warrior or wealthy merchant. The title “Kidai Shoran” means “superior scenery of a brilliant age”. The commissioner must have wanted to bequeath an image of Edo’s prosperity of the time to future generations. However, the incorrect later placement of gold leaf place names on the scroll means that the commissioner or owner at the time was not a local of the area. Many mistakes in sticking place names to the scroll are made including the misnaming of Takasago Shindo Street as “Ukiyo-koji” Street at Muromachi 1-chome, Ukiyo-koji Street at Muromachi 3-chome is mixed up with “Goza-ten” shop, and Odawara-cho Town is misnamed Oda-cho.

Discovery:

The scroll was discovered in the attic of Professor Hans-Joachim Kuster and his wife Inge in Berlin in 1995. Professor Kuster taught biology at Berlin Free University. The Kusters were collectors of Chinese art and supporters of the Asian Art Museum, Berlin. The scroll was donated to the Museum as part of the Kuster Collection of Chinese art through a gift arranged by Manfred Bohms. It is unknown how the scroll came to be in the Kuster Collection. The scroll was stored in the Chinese collection of the Museum until 1999 when Professor Kuster died and his Collection was examined. At that time the Curator of Japanese works in the Museum realised that the scroll was not Chinese but in fact a work of art from Japan.

The Director of the Asian Art Museum, Berlin then asked Professor Tadashi Kobayashi of Gakushuin University to examine the scroll. Professor Kobayashi was giving visiting lectures in Cologne, and at the Rietberg Museum (Switzerland) and at the Berlin Free University. After finishing his lectures Professor Kobayashi was able to examine the scroll.

The scroll was displayed for the first time in central position at an exhibition to celebrate the opening of the new Japan Galleries of the Asian Art Museum, Berlin. It then returned to Japan on two occasions. The first was from 5 January - 23 February 2003 at the Edo-Tokyo Museum in an exhibition entitled “808 Towns of Great Edo” celebrating the 10th anniversary of the opening of the Edo-Tokyo Museum and the 400th anniversary of the establishment of the Edo Shogunate. The second occasion was at the Mitsui Memorial Museum from 7 January - 12 February 2006 in an exhibition to celebrate the opening of the new Mitsui Memorial Museum entitled “Nihonbashi Picture Scrolls”.

Following these exhibitions a 1.4 times sized facsimile was produced by the Nihonbashi Preservation Association and the Nihonbashi Renaissance Committee under the supervision of the Edo-Tokyo Museum. This facsimile is now displayed in the underground concourse of Tokyo Metro’s Mitsukoshimae Subway Station. Interpretation was provided next to the display which opened on 30 November 2009.

The original scroll remains in the Collection of the Asian Art Museum in Berlin which is now part of the Humboldt Forum, Berliner Schloss.

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