Title: Yoroi Doku chaku-den Suzuki kaden (The Suzuki Family Tradition of Armor), Copied 1811. With 25 Beautiful Paintings of Donning Armor. A Contemporary Copy of a Young Daimyo’s Military Manual
Author: Derived from Daimyo Mizuno Tadamichi; Copied by Suzuki Yoshikuni
Condition: Very Good
A Late Edo Period, early 19th century manuscript, entitled Yoroi Doku chaku-den Suzuki Kaden, or the Suzuki Family Tradition of Armor. As the title entails, the manuscript goes into length on the correct, consecutive stages on how to properly prepare and wear the many layers of clothing and armor needed for a samurai. What makes this manuscript much more unique however, is that it is a manuscript copied after a military manual penned by a young Daimyo Mizuno Tadamichi, who in later life served as chief senior councillor (Rōjū) in service to the Tokugawa Shogunate. The copyist appears to be one Suzuki Yoshikuni, who copied the original manuscript very shortly after the Daimyo’s military education, as the manuscript is dated 1811, and Tadamachi would have completed his manual a year or two ago, since it indicates he was 14-15 years old at the time of the original manuscript being penned.
The work does seem to be heavily reminiscent of Sadatake’s Yoshiie Ason Yoroi chakuyō-zu, also known as The Order of Wearing a Japanese Armor, but there are some notable differences to the stages of wearing armor.
Altogether, there are 25 nicely detailed and hand-colored paintings displaying all the steps necessary to correctly dress into one’s armor, from wearing the correct undergarments, sleeve guards, putting on various layers of clothes before donning armor, with a considerable focus on the last, with many stages.
The emakimono has been bound in a scroll format for preservation, with a beautiful brocade decorated cover, and there are small jikusaki (knobs) made of wood. There is a narrow wooden box to accompany it, preserving the scroll.
One brocade bound emakimono (picture scroll) on paper, roughly 28 x 660 cm. The knobs are not included as part of the measurement.
This handscroll is in very good shape, with minor rubbing and wear to the brocade fabric. There is some staining to the upper half of the scroll at the beginning, and a few vertical strips where each painting as attached.