Mi Ikenohata

Part of Yajima Gōgaku's series pairing the twelve animals of the Chinese sexagenary cycle with famous sites of Edo, this sheet links the snake (mi) with Ikenohata, the leafy district along the eastern shore of Shinobazu Pond beneath the Ueno hill. Ikenohata was celebrated for its summer lotus-viewing, its riverside teahouses, and its Benten shrine on the island in the pond - all locations strongly associated with the snake through its sacred attachment to the goddess Benzaiten, whose messenger the white snake was understood to be. Gōgaku's literati treatment uses restrained colour and an open, calligraphically drawn figure to evoke the late-Bunsei Edo scene of cultivated leisure. The small sheet, roughly 21 by 19 centimetres, was issued between 1818 and 1830 in the New Year's egoyomi tradition of zodiac-calendar prints.