three full lines and one partial line of bold text; two short lines of smaller text below partial line of text at left edge; two square red seals, LLQ

Mount Fuji, late 18th century

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Shibano Ritsuzan was a Confucian scholar and literatus—a learned person who cultivated his skills in arts and letters. In 1787 he was summoned to serve the Tokugawa shogunate government. Ritsuzan became one of the main architects of legal codes that enforced the stricter Neo-Confucian teachings of Zhu Xi (1130–1200) and ended earlier steps towards liberalization. This is one of Ritsuzan’s most famous verses. Written in running script, he disregarded the five-character format of his poem and wrote it rather unorthodox in four columns of 13-12-12-3 characters:

誰将東海水 濯出玉芙蓉 幡地三 / 州尽 挿天八葉重 雲霞蒸大麓 / 日月避中峰 獨立原無競 自為 / 衆嶽宗
Who took water from the Eastern Sea, / And washed this lovely lotus so clean' / The mountain bestrides three provinces, / A mound of eight petals piercing the skies. / Clouds and mist ring the great foothills like steam; / The sun and moon shun her central peak. / Alone she stands, ever without peer, / The grandest mountain of them all!
(Trans. Timothy Bradstock, Judith Rabinovitch)

Details
Title
Mount Fuji
Artist Life
1736 - 1807
Role
Calligrapher
Accession Number
2013.63.30
Curator Approved

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three full lines and one partial line of bold text; two short lines of smaller text below partial line of text at left edge; two square red seals, LLQ