The loyalty of the Kusonoki clan at the battle at Shijônawate

A musha-e commemorating the Battle of Shijōnawate (1348), in which Kusunoki Masatsura — son of Masashige — died fighting for Emperor Go-Daigo's Southern Court against the Ashikaga shogunate's forces. The Kusunoki name became synonymous with samurai loyalty (chūgi), and Masatsura's death at twenty-two was held up during the Meiji period as a model of patriotic sacrifice. Gekko's composition arrays multiple armored figures in dynamic combat, with banners, drawn swords, and the diagonal energy typical of late nineteenth-century warrior prints. The carving emphasizes textile detailing of armor lacing (odoshi) and the Kusunoki mon — the chrysanthemum on water. Such subjects served the Meiji government's project of constructing a unified national history through visual culture; Gekko produced warrior prints alongside his contemporaneous senso-e (war prints) documenting the Sino-Japanese conflict of 1894–95, the genre conventions of the two overlapping considerably.