[Map of Tokyo] Chikyo, c.1861

• Title: [Map of Tokyo]
• Author: Kageyama Chikyo
• Date: c.1861
• Condition: Excellent - some slight separations at folds. Still bound in original blue covers.
• Inches: 27 x 13 1/2 [Image]
• Centimeters: 68.58 x 34.29 [Image]
• Product ID: 308592

Wonderfully Preserved Woodblock Map of Tokyo from the Edo Period

This map was created by Kageyama Chikyo and published by Owariya Seishichi. The map shows a portion of Shiba and Takanawa Districts in Tokyo, now part of present-day Minato Ward, located southwest of the Imperial Palace. The inset map is a continuation of the map toward the west, as indicated in the western margin (at top). This colorful woodblock pocket map was printed on two sheets and joined, as issued. The map folds into stiff paper self-wrappers in bright blue with a paper label on front wrapper. Travel and tourist maps are called dochuzu or "on-the-road-maps".

Japanese cartography appeared as early as the 1600’s. Known for exceptional beauty and high quality of workmanship, early Japanese cartography has its own very distinctive projection and layout system. Japanese maps made prior to the appearance of Commodore Perry and the opening of Japan in the mid to late 1850s often have no firm directional orientation, incorporate views into the map proper, and tend to be hand colored woodblock prints.

The Edo period, from the 1603 to 1867, is considered by some to be the Golden Age of Japanese Cartography. Most maps from this period, which followed isolationist ideology, predictably focus on Japan. The greatest cartographer of the period, whose work redefined all subsequent cartography, was Ino Tadataka (1745 -1818).  Ino's maps of Japan were so detailed that, when the European cartographers arrived they had no need, even with their far more sophisticated survey equipment, to remap the region. Japanese maps produced in the late Edo and throughout the Meiji period draw heavily upon western maps as models in both their content and overall cartographic style. While many of these later maps maintain elements of traditional Japanese cartography such as the use of rice paper, woodblock printing, and delicate hand color, they also incorporate western directional orientation, projection systems, and structural norms.

Background on Creator

Kageyama Chikyo (1897–1966) was a distinguished Japanese painter and printmaker best known for his contributions to twentieth-century Nihonga, a modern form of traditional Japanese painting. He was acclaimed for his landscape and floral works, marked by subtle color modulation and strong compositional balance, which frequently drew inspiration from the natural beauty of Japan. Kageyama’s artistic legacy resides in his successful fusion of historical technique and contemporary aesthetic, and his works remain celebrated in Japanese museum collections and exhibitions today.