Hi.
Guys who are engaged in historical reconstruction, found in a treatise of the 18th century, telling about the invasion of Korea in the late 16th century, such a drawing.I've never seen anything like it before.The armor and weapon doesn't match the period, and I haven't heard of bull riding either.An artist's fiction?
What do you think of this?

Hi Vladimir!

I showed your picture to a real Japan expert (Till Weber) and asked him your questions. I've just got an answere - here is t...:

"I can help you with the picture. It comes from the "Ehon Taikoki", which is an edition of several 100 B / W woodcuts that show the life of the Toyotomi Hideyoshi. They are based on his biography "Taikoki". The timeline is like this: died in 1598; written biography over several decades from approx. 1630; Woodcuts around 1800 (you can read the exact numbers everywhere); Bunraku play; Kabuki; 20th century: novel by Ryotaro Shiba and Eiji Yoshikawa ("Taiko", also in German); TV films - the full program. The Ukiyo-e artists around 1800, also very well-known people among them, got into official trouble at the time because "pillar saints" of the Tokugawa dynasty could not be depicted simply.

Here you have an impression of a partial volume in old print:
http://www.bwoom-japan.de/Hideyoshi HSB079.html

The episode of Ehon Taikoki shows Hideyoshi's entire life in chronological order, with some legends, but mostly striving for solid illustration. There are also quite a few pictures in Korea towards the end, but your board is clearly labeled in Japanese, in italic Hiragana, so that even less educated people can read it.

Do you have a number or a (Japanese?) Signature for the sheet? Unfortunately, the Ehon Taikoki is not completely online. But I copied and bound all 600 sheets, but in my office - and we have a home office! You would have to go through them to identify historical or legendary events. It is surely one of the countless anecdotes from Hideyoshi's life in which samurai rode water buffalos. Maybe with the Kyushu field stuff, because these animals are mainly in the south from Kyushu to Okinawa.

If someone wants to make pewter figurines with samurai on buffalo - they will surely also suit the Satsuma invasion in Ryukyu 1609! To complete the exotic, the samurai from Kagoshima are also given baskets of venomous snakes to the vine and covered with Chinese fire pipes!

Hideyoshi is the 2nd Reich unifier. The title "Shogun" was denied because of its origin. He was actually nothing more than a runaway owner. Nevertheless, he managed to ascend to Japan's ruler.


The two Korean invasions took place under his aegis. Historians disagree here. Some believe that Hideyoshi actually wanted to conquer China and needed Korea as a bridgehead. I personally believe in the other version: Japan was practically reunited under Hideyoshi. During the sengoku-ji-dai (age of the countries at war), the mass army had developed for warfare. This included the new profession of ashigaru (paid foot warrior: archer and archer gunner = specialist or polearmaker = cannon fodder). So when there was not so much to do, Hideyoshi had to employ around 1 million professional warriors (samurai + ashigaru). The Korean campaign was therefore launched. Hideyoshi was not there personally, but handed the command over to Kato Kiomasa (his best buddy - son of a farrier). He hoped that the expected loss would do the job itself ..."

So the picture is no fake bis shows a real situation.

Hope that helps!


Cheers

Martin, thank you.
The person who shared these drawings is just as sure of their authenticity. However, he is not sure that the artist drew historical paintings, and not comic ones.
Of course, this is an interesting theme for miniatures.

Thank You, Felix!