About This Print

Print No. 29 of 120 prints issued as part of the series Nōgaku hyakuban (One Hundred Prints of Noh), depicting a scene from the play Kagekiyo, sometimes attributed to the playwright Zeami Motokiyo (1363-1443).¹   In this scene Kagekiyo, blind and old, stands alone in his hut. This print was originally released by the publisher Matsuki Heikichi in the tenthinstallment of prints in this series.  This series' prints were offered in monthly installments consisting of three prints packaged in an envelope with additional descriptive information.<sup>2 

1</sup> According to the The Ohtsuki Noh Theatre Foundation website "While many secondary sources attribute it to Zeami (1363? – 1443?), there seems to be no clear evidence for this."
² “The series Nogaku hyakuban (100 No plays) by Tsukioka Kogyo (1869-1927),” Claus-Peter Schulz, Andon 67, Society for Japanese Arts, p. 28.

The Play - Kagekiyo

Source: The Beauty of Silence: Nō and Nature Prints by Tsukioka Kōgyo (1869-1927), Robert Schaap & J. Thomas Rimer, Hotei Publishing, 2010, p. 105.
Hitomaru (tsure), the young daughter of the defeated Taira warrior Kagekibyo (shite), travels from her home in Kamakura to Kyushu to visit her father, now blind and living in exile.  She has never known him.  She finds an old man leading a wretched life in a humble hut, but he sends her away without revealing his identity.  Hitomaru then meets a kind villager (waki) who tells her that the old man is indeed her father Kagekiyo.  The villager unites father and daughter.  Kagekiyo agrees to tell her the story of his last battle on the condition that she leave as soon as he finishes.  He relates the tale of his last fight at the Battle of Yashima (1185), a climactic encounter between the Taira and Minamoto forces.  Then, as she has promised, she leaves him in his solitude.

The Original Envelope and Label

Print Details