This fine painting depicts a ‘daimyo’ preparing to leave for battle. His wives attend him, one offering refreshment, while another holds his helmet.

two vassals await him, kneeling on either side of the steps to the home. One more vassal attends the ‘daimyo’s’ horse. Very interestingly he is wearing a ‘jingasa’ (light head protection) in the form of a ‘nanban boshi’ (foreigner’s hat), something very rare and unusual at the time.

Whilst there are depictions of foreigners obviously wearing foreign dress in Japanese art, there are extraordinarily few depictions of Japanese wearing western garb. thus the subject of this scroll is very rare.

Miyagawa Issho was born in the latter half of the 17th Century dying in his late seventies. he made his name as a wood block artist.

Ink gold and colour on paper with paulownia wood storage box.

Mounts dimensions 155cm high by 98cm wide

Painting dimensions 51cm high by 83cm wide