…; purchased from the dealer C.P.J. van der Peet Japanese Prints, Amsterdam, by J.H.W. Goslings (1943-2011), Epse, near Deventer, 1993;¹¹Coll. cat. Goslings 1999, p. 64, cat. no. 142 by whom donated to the museum, 1995

Object number: RP-P-1995-296

Credit line: Gift of J.H.W. Goslings, Epse

A sumo wrestler wearing a ceremonial apron inscribed with its name, standing by the straw ring marking the centre circle.

The Sumo Wrestler Shiganomine Otokichi, Shiga[no]mine Otokichi.

Bickford reads the name of the wrestler as Yotsugamine Otokichi (L. Bickford, Sumo and the Woodblock Print Masters, Tokyo 1944, 66). The print was apparently designed to celebrate the wrestler's promotion in III/1819. It was later reissued with a few changes, probably as soon as 1821: a title was added, A Series of Three on Sumo, Sumo sanbantsuzuki, with the emblem of the Taikogawa above; the straw forming the edge of the ring was not printed in gold, as here; four poems were replaced by three others, by Chikusotei Kazunori, Kei?do Chiyosumi and Dondontei [Wataru].

The same wrestler was also portrayed wearing a kimono, with two swords, and holding a pipe and smoking set in a commercially issued print by Katsukawa Shunei, (see Bickford, op. cit., 66).

Four poems by Gobaian Azemono; his housewife, Gobaian kafu Kagetsudo Rishu; another of Gobaian’s housewives; onajiku Sensentei Riyu me (female); and his (Gobaian’s) steward, onajiku shitsuji Baiso Momotori(?). The poems are all haiku, rare on Edo surimono. For the poets, cf. RP-P-1958-599.

Issued by the poets, 1819/III
Signature reading: Kansetsusai Tsukimaro zu

M. Forrer, Surimono in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Leiden 2013, no. 491

M. Forrer, 2013, 'Kitagawa Tsukimaro, A Sumo Wrestler, Japan, 1819', in Surimono from the Goslings Collection in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200382614