Samurai of the Satsuma clan, fighting for the Imperial side during the Boshin War period.
The Boshin War was a civil war in Japan, fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and those seeking to return political power to the imperial court. The war found its origins in dissatisfaction among many nobles and young samurai with the shogunate's handling of foreigners following the opening of Japan the prior decade. An alliance of southern samurai and court officials secured the cooperation of the young Emperor Meiji, who declared the abolition of the two and a half century old shogunate. Military movements by imperial forces and partisan violence in Edo led Tokugawa Yoshinobu, the sitting shogun, to launch a military campaign to seize the emperor's court at Kyoto. The military tide rapidly turned in favor of the smaller but relatively modernized imperial faction, and after a series of battles culminating in the surrender of Edo, Yoshinobu personally surrendered. The Tokugawa remnant retreated to northern Honshū and later to Hokkaidō, where they founded the Ezo republic. Defeat at the Battle of Hakodate broke this last holdout and left the imperial rule supreme throughout the whole of Japan, completing the military phase of the Meiji Restoration. Around 120,000 men were mobilized during the conflict, and of these about 3,500 were killed. In the end, the victorious imperial faction abandoned its objective to expel foreigners from Japan and instead adopted a policy of continued modernization with an eye to eventual renegotiation of the Unequal Treaties with the Western powers. (Full article...)
Asahi Breweries is a Japanese global beer, spirits, soft drinks and food business group. This photograph, taken during the blue hour with a full moon, shows the headquarters of Asahi Breweries in Sumida, Tokyo, as viewed from the wharf on the Sumida River near Azuma Bridge. The Asahi Beer Hall, topped by the Asahi Flame, designed by Philippe Starck, is visible on the right, with the Tokyo Skytree in the background on the left.
Flowering Plum Tree (after Hiroshige), a copy of the ukiyo-e woodblock print Plum Park in Kameido by the Japanese artist Hiroshige. Completed in 1887, this painting is one of several Japanese-influenced works created by Vincent van Gogh after the opening up of Japan. In his copy, van Gogh ignored the shading present in the trunk and background of Hiroshige's image, which there implied age, and instead used colours with more "passion" and "youthfulness".
This panorama by Felice Beato—called Panorama of Yedo from Atagoyama, c.1865—showes daimyō residences in Edo (now Tokyo). Five albumen silver prints were joined together to form the image.
A registration card for Louis Wijnhamer (1904–1975), an ethnic Dutch humanitarian who was captured soon after the Empire of Japan occupied the Dutch East Indies in March 1942. Prior to the occupation, many ethnic Europeans had refused to leave, expecting the Japanese occupation government to keep a Dutch administration in place. When Japanese troops took control of government infrastructure and services such as ports and postal services, 100,000 European (and some Chinese) civilians were interned in prisoner-of-war camps where the death rates were between 13 and 30 per cent. Wijnhamer was interned in a series of camps throughout Southeast Asia and, after the surrender of Japan, returned to what was now Indonesia, where he lived until his death.
The Japanese government-issued dollar was a form of currency issued between 1942 and 1945 for use within the territories of Singapore, Malaya, North Borneo, Sarawak and Brunei, under occupation by Imperial Japan during World War II. The currency, informally referred to as "banana money", was released solely in the form of banknotes, as metals were considered essential to the war effort. The languages used on the notes were reduced to English and Japanese. Each note bears a different obverse and reverse design, but all have a similar layout, and were marked with stamped block letters that begin with "M" for "Malaya". This 1944 one-hundred-dollar Japanese-issued banknote, depicting a Malay house with palm trees on the obverse, and a man with water buffaloes in a stream on the reverse, is part of the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian Institution.
Other denominations: '"`UNIQ--templatestyles-0000000D-QINU`"'
Before the outbreak of World War I, German naval ships were located in the Pacific; Tsingtao developed into a major seaport while the surrounding Kiautschou Bay area was leased to Germany since 1898. During the war, Japanese and British Allied troops besieged the port in 1914 before capturing it from the German and Austro-Hungarian Central Powers, occupying the city and the surrounding region. It served as a base for the exploitation of the natural resources of Shandong province and northern China, and a "New City District" was established to furnish the Japanese colonists with commercial sections and living quarters. Tsingtao eventually reverted to Chinese rule by 1922.
The siege of Osaka was a series of battles undertaken by the Japanese Tokugawa shogunate against the Toyotomi clan, and ending in the clan's dissolution. Divided into two stages (the winter campaign and the summer campaign), and lasting from 1614 to 1615, the siege put an end to the last major armed opposition to the shogunate's establishment. This eight-metre-long (26 ft) painting, titled The Summer Battle of Osaka Castle and executed on a Japanese folding screen, illustrates Osaka Castle under siege, and was commissioned by the daimyoKuroda Nagamasa, who took a team of painters with him to the battlefield to record the event. The painting depicts 5071 people and 21 generals, and is held in the collection of Osaka Castle.
Banknotes: Empire of Japan. Reproduction: National Numismatic Collection, National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution
The Japanese-issued Netherlands Indies gulden was the currency issued by the Japanese Empire when it occupied the Dutch East Indies during World War II. Following the Dutch capitulation in March 1942, the Japanese closed all banks, seized assets and currency, and assumed control of the economy in the territory. They began issuing military banknotes, as had previously been done in other occupied territories. These were printed in Japan, but retained the name of the pre-war currency and replaced the Dutch gulden at par. From 1943 the military banknotes were replaced by identical bank-issued notes printed within the territory, and the currency was renamed the roepiah from 1944. The currency was replaced by the Indonesian rupiah in 1946, one year after the Japanese surrender and the country's independence.
This note, denominated five gulden, is part of the 1942 series.
Kabukidō Enkyō (歌舞伎堂 艶鏡, fl. c. 1796) was a Japanese artist who designed ukiyo-e woodblock prints. Nothing is known of Enkyō's life, and only seven of his works are known, all of which are ōkubiyakusha-e, bust portrait prints of kabuki actors. Scholars divide them into two groups based on differences in the signatures, and the second group appears to be a set, as the prints depict three brothers from the same play. Enkyō's identity has been subject to speculation: a student of Sharaku's, even Sharaku himself, or a kyōgen playwright. (Full article...)
Tottori Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūgoku region on Honshūisland. The capital is the city of Tottori. It is the least populous prefecture in Japan. Tottori is home to the Tottori Sand Dunes, Japan's only large dune system. The prefecture is heavily agricultural and its products are shipped to major cities. Some of the famous products are nashi pear, nagaimo, rakkyo, negi (shiro-negi, Welsh onion), and watermelon. Tottori Prefecture's symbol is derived from the first mora in Japanese for "と" combined with the picture of a flying bird, and symbolizes peace, liberty, and the advancement of the Tottori prefecture. It was enacted in 1968 to celebrate the 100th year from the first year of the Meiji Era.
The following are images from various Japan-related articles on Wikipedia.
Image 1Map showing the territories of major daimyō families around 1570 CE (from History of Japan)
Image 2A social hierarchy chart based on old academic theories. Such hierarchical diagrams were removed from Japanese textbooks after various studies in the 1990s revealed that peasants, craftsmen, and merchants were in fact equal and merely social categories. Successive shoguns held the highest or near-highest court ranks, higher than most court nobles. (from History of Japan)
Image 22Relief map of the land and the seabed of Japan. It shows the surface and underwater terrain of the Japanese archipelago. (from Geography of Japan)
Image 34Mount Aso 4 pyroclastic flow and the spread of Aso 4 tephra (90,000 to 85,000 years ago). The pyroclastic flow reached almost the whole area of Kyushu, and volcanic ash was deposited of 15 cm in a wide area from Kyushu to southern Hokkaido. (from Geography of Japan)
Image 35The Kuril Islands, with their Russian names. The borders of the Treaty of Shimoda (1855) and the Treaty of St. Petersburg (1875) are shown in red. Currently, all islands northeast of Hokkaido are administered by Russia. (from Geography of Japan)
Image 36Hōryū-ji is widely known to be the oldest wooden architecture existing in the world. (from Culture of Japan)
Image 37Samurai could kill a commoner for the slightest insult and were widely feared by the Japanese population. Edo period, 1798. (from History of Japan)
Image 53Japanese experts inspect the scene of the alleged railway sabotage on South Manchurian Railway that led to the Mukden Incident and the Japanese occupation of Manchuria. (from History of Japan)
Image 64Minamoto no Yoritomo was the founder of the Kamakura shogunate in 1192. This was the first military government in which the shogun with the samurai were the de facto rulers of Japan. (from History of Japan)
Image 65Samurai of the Satsuma Domain during the Boshin War (from History of Japan)
Image 66Japanese archipelago with outlined islands (from Geography of Japan)
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