Preparing Seven Herbs on the Seventh Day of the New Year

Preparing Seven Herbs on the Seventh Day of the New Year, dated 1798 and in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago, depicts the ritual preparation of nanakusa-gayu - the seven-herb rice porridge eaten on the seventh day of the New Year (Jinjitsu, January 7) as a folk-medicinal observance meant to ward off illness and promote longevity. The ceremony, which entailed chopping the seven specified herbs in a prescribed order while reciting verses, had been part of Japanese New Year custom for centuries and offered a natural subject for [surimono](/glossary/surimono) made to circulate among kyoka circles around the New Year. Shunman pictures women and household figures engaged in the herb-cutting, the wooden chopping board and the bunches of greens carefully rendered, the auspicious occasion underscored by the inscribed kyoka. The image belongs to the tradition of nenchu gyoji-e (pictures of annual observances), but the surimono format gives it an intimacy that the commercial print marketplace rarely permitted: this is not a public celebration but a small domestic ritual, witnessed at close range. The 1798 dating places the print in the period when Shunman was deepening his commitment to surimono production, with the formula of seasonal observance plus kyoka inscription becoming a signature mode. The Art Institute of Chicago's preservation of the print with its inscriptions intact allows the full poetic and visual occasion to be reconstructed.