Title: Ogura Hyakunin Isshu, late Edo period
Author: Fujiwara no Teika
Condition: Poor
A late Edo period copy of Teika's popular anthology, the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu. Roughly translated, it means One Hundred People, One Hundred Poems.
Teika has long been renowned as one of the greatest poets in Japan, and dominated the poetry scene for centuries from the Heian period to the Meiji era. It's no surprise that he would eventually create an anthology of poetical works, including one poem of his own. The full name of Ogura Hyakunin Isshu comes from the fact that he had arranged these poems for Utsunomiya Yoritsuna, the father in law of Teika's son Tameie, who was working near Mount Ogura at the time.
For each poem, renowned ukiyo-e artist Hishikawa Moronobu created a woodblock portrait of each poet.
One volume in 8vo, 52 leaves, with a profuse number of woodblock illustrations.
On note of condition, this book has several issues to indicate:
There is heavy wear on the book covers including some tears, some worming present, some of the pages have smudges and wrinkles, and the end papers seem to have hair stuck onto them. Despite the damage, the woodblock illustrations are all legible, and all of the pages are still present.