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Segawa Tomisaburō as the courtezan Tōyama, sheltering a child.
This print must belong either with this play or with Hanaayame Bunroku Soga because of the way it is signed and because Segawa Tomisaburō II was appearing at the Miyako-za. We eliminate the other of the two possibilities partly because Sharaku’s representations (numbers 4 and 9) of the actor in the earlier production show the different hair arrangement appropriate to a totally different type of character. Incidentally the records of Keisei Sanbon Karakasa list Tomisaburō as having taken the part of Tōyama and no other rôle in this play and they show that several children appeared during the course of the action; but which of them is being protected in the picture under discussion we cannot say. In any case as there are no hosoye that can be assigned definitely to fifth month productions this one presumably belongs here.
We place the print tentatively as the central sheet of a triptych.
The costume worn by the actor is purple over rose, that of the child is rose and white.
There are two impressions in American collections. The subject was unknown to the compilers of the Vignier-Inada Catalogue and was described but not reproduced by Kurth. Rumpf for his number 62 reproduces the inscribed impression known to Kurth in the dealer’s advertisement to which we have made reference under the preceding number. No other seems to have been recorded.
Hosoye. Yellow ground. Signed: Tōshūsai Sharaku.
Ledoux Collection.
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