Choju Jinbutsu Giga (Ink on Paper)

Four Scrolls, National Treasure since 1952

Ink Painting on Paper: Choju Jinbutsu Giga (紙本墨画鳥獣人物戯画) is a set of handscrolls owned by Kosanji at Umegahata, Ukyo Ward, Kyoto City, Kyoto Prefecture, designated a National Treasure on 29 March 1952. The quantity is four scrolls, the category painting, the period Heian to Kamakura.

The Agency for Cultural Affairs leaves the field for designation as an Important Cultural Property blank, so the work went to National Treasure without that earlier step, the ninth such case among the properties covered here.

The commentary reads: a work of the Heian and Kamakura periods. That two periods are involved is noted; dimensions, contents and assessment are not. This is the sixth one-sentence commentary among the properties covered here.

The Fragment's Record Explains the Whole

An important account of this work appears in the record for a different property.

There is an entry for a detached fragment of the first scroll, dated to the twelfth century in the late Heian period, ink on paper, 29.2 centimetres by 51.6 centimetres, recorded as having come down at Kosanji and formerly in the collection of Sakai Hoitsu.

Its commentary states: the first scroll was originally two scrolls, but it suffered damage in the course of transmission, and the present first scroll is thought to be what survived, put together as one.

One of the four scrolls was once two. The recorded quantity of four is therefore not the original form.

None of this appears in the record for the scrolls themselves, whose single sentence names only the periods and says nothing of how the scrolls came down. The same thing happened with the Wuzhun Shifan portrait at Tofukuji, where the wooden box was mentioned only on the other record.

Passages Lost and Out of Order

The fragment's record goes further.

Accordingly there are omissions and passages out of sequence, and several further fragments are known to have been detached and lost.

Omissions are missing portions; passages out of sequence are sections whose order has been disturbed. Beyond these, more than one fragment is known to have been separated and to survive elsewhere.

The record adds that the fragment it describes is one of those lost pieces, and became known comparatively recently. The fragment itself came to light only later.

The four scrolls designated a National Treasure have come down with gaps and with their order disturbed. The Agency's record for the scrolls does not mention this.

The Fragment's Ownership Can Be Traced

The fragment's record also sets out how it changed hands.

From a certificate of authentication by Sumiyoshi Hirotaka attached to it, and the corresponding entry in the Sumiyoshi family's records of authentication, it is known that the piece was owned in the late Edo period by a man named Kitani Kiroku, and that it later passed to Nagai Jissoku, a well-known collector of the Meiji era.

From a certificate and its counterfoil, two owners are identified. That much is written about a single detached fragment.

The record for the National Treasure itself names Kosanji as owner and nothing more. Its address field is blank.

Fullness of record does not follow rank of listing. The fragment is described at length, it seems, because it came to notice recently.

Seeing Them

Kosanji, in Ukyo Ward, Kyoto City, owns the scrolls. These are temple holdings, not objects kept on permanent display.

Accounts elsewhere call this the oldest manga in Japan. No such statement appears in the Agency's record, which offers no comparison with other works and no comparison of dates.

Handscrolls are vulnerable to light and are usually shown only for short periods. All four are not necessarily shown at once, and a scroll may be opened only in part.

They may appear in special exhibitions at museums, so watch for notice of a showing. Conditions of access can change.