Toyotomi Hideyoshi, samurai and power intrigue - Japanese book illustrated by Utagawa Kuniyoshi, late Edo

This is an individual book from the famous Japanese historical cycle Ehon Toyotomi Kunkoki - a major narrative project centered on the world of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, associated with Yanagisuitei Tanekiyo and with confirmed illustration by Utagawa Kuniyoshi. It is an authentic Japanese woodblock-printed book in which literature, history, warrior culture, and book illustration are brought together in a single object. It brings together exactly the themes that make works like this especially compelling for a modern buyer: samurai subject matter, struggles for power, political tension, intrigue, the momentum of a large historical narrative, and the visual energy of classical Japanese illustration. The illustration of this particular copy is confirmed by Waseda University Library and other bibliographic records for this edition.

Attribution

Title: Ehon Toyotomi Kunkoki
Author: Yanagisuitei Tanekiyo
Illustrator: Utagawa Kuniyoshi - the illustration of this particular copy is confirmed by Waseda University Library and Japanese bibliographic records
Format: Japanese woodblock-printed book, wahon
Series position: part 4, book 4
Period: late Edo edition line, consistent with the documented 1857-1863 publication history of the series
Printing method: woodblock print on Japanese paper
Subject: historical narrative centered on Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the warrior world, military action, power, and political struggle
Condition: Antique, from good to very good visual condition; clean cover label, strong impression, clear illustration line, and a well-preserved block in the photographed pages
Size (approx.): 22.5 x 15.7 cm
Shipping: Safe and tracked shipping from Latvia (Riga Gallery of Japanese Art CloudyYokomido)
For US buyers: this item enters the United States duty-free.

Extended description

For this particular copy, the correct dating is the late Edo edition line, consistent with the documented publication history of the series between 1857 and 1863. This places the book in its proper historical context: not as a later decorative revival, but as a work belonging to the real publishing tradition of the late Edo period, connected with one of the known historical-illustrated book cycles devoted to Toyotomi Hideyoshi.

The authorial level is no less important. Ehon Toyotomi Kunkoki is associated with Yanagisuitei Tanekiyo and belongs to that line of Japanese historical narrative literature in which action, power, military memory, intrigue, and visual dramaturgy are brought together in a unified book object. That is why this book reads not only as an antique edition, but as a compact concentration of period culture, literature, painting, and history.

For this copy, the name Utagawa Kuniyoshi is especially important. It is not decorative and not incidental here. Museum and catalog records for Ehon Toyotomi Kunkoki directly connect issues of the series with Utagawa Kuniyoshi. This gives the book additional weight: it is not simply a historical Japanese book, but a historical Japanese book with a confirmed illustrator of the level of Utagawa Kuniyoshi - one of the strongest masters of the Utagawa school and one of the most widely recognized names in nineteenth-century Japanese art.

That is why the object works on several levels at once. It is a historical book connected with the figure of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. It is a late Edo Japanese woodblock book. It is a collectible object in which text, history, and image were conceived as a single whole from the start. And it is a work in which samurai, power, intrigue, risk, heroic memory, and the visual force of Japanese graphic art are gathered into a compact and persuasive form.