About This Print

Print number 6 六 in the series Nihon chishi ryakuzu (Simple Illustrations of Places in Japan) consisting of at least 78 prints.  The series formed a type of geographical primer of Japan and the prints were sold individually and bound into albums as can be seen in the below book in the collection of the British Museum.

This print pictures the village of Ueno 上野 and a bridge over the Nagata River 長田川.  The village was located near Iga Ueno Castle, built around 1570 and known for having the highest stone wall in Japan.  Hiroshige III has been inspired by (or just copied) the below scene from his master Utagawa Hiroshige I's 1853 print Iga Province: Ueno  from the series Famous Places in the Sixty Odd Provinces pictured below.


Iga Province (伊賀国, Iga no kuni) was an old province of Japan in the area that is today western Mie Prefecture. Iga bordered on Ise, Ōmi, Yamato, and Yamashiro Provinces.

¹ Wikipedia website http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iga_Province

Print Details

IHL Catalog	#552
Title or Description	Iga Province: Ueno Nagatagawa 伊賀国: 上野 長田川
Series	Nihon chishi ryakuzu 日本地誌略図 (Simple Illustrations of Places in Japan or Topographical Sketches of Japan)
Artist	Utagawa Hiroshige III (1842–1894)
Signature	Hiroshige ga 廣重画
Seal	none
Publication Date	1876 (Meiji 9)
Publisher	Fujiokaya Keijirō 藤岡屋慶次郎 (family name: Mizuno Keijirō 水野慶次郎) [Marks: pub. ref. 063] publisher's name or seal not present on this collection's print as it is in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston print
Impression	excellent
Colors	excellent
Condition	fair - center fold with reinforcement verso; rubbing and image loss around image border; soiling mainly along margin
Genre	ukiyo-e, fūkei-ga
Miscellaneous
Format	chuban
H x W Paper	6 7/8 x 9 1/2 in. (17.5 x 24.1 cm)
H x W Image	6 3/8 x 8 7/8 in. (16.2 x 22.5 cm)
Literature
Collections This Print	British Museum 1973,0723,0.34; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 06.1754