1889 Ichikawa Six-Sheet Japanese World Map

Features the flag of the Republic of Texas.

This is a scarce, unjoined six-sheet 1889 (Meiji 22) Ichikawa Raijirō map of the World. A distinctive product of the Meiji Era, the map scrupulously includes not only geographic information but also reference material from a range of related sciences. The map, although well after the fact, includes the flag of the Republic of Texas - suggesting Japanese recognition of the short-lived state.

Cataloging the World

The information contained here is so abundant that the map serves as an atlas and almanac together. At the top-left is a legend indicating symbols for geographic and maritime features, railways, and telegraph lines. At the top-center, just below the title, is a banner showing the various flags of the Japanese military forces, the imperial family, the merchant fleet, and so on. Along the top are a set of insets detailing major Japanese ports (Niigata, Yokohama, and Tokyo, Nagasaki, Kobe, and Hakodate). At the bottom, another set of inset maps depicts (from left to right): Egypt, Southampton, the Cape of Good Hope, Singapore, the Sunda Strait (between Java and Sumatra), the Pearl River Delta, Shanghai, Port Philip (Melbourne), Honolulu, New York City, Panama, San Francisco, and Rio de Janeiro.

The Map Itself

The map demonstrates considerable accuracy, even more than many maps of the later Meiji. Also worth noting is the placement of Japan at the center of the map, shrinking the southern hemisphere to accommodate it. Below the map are a series of insets covering a wide range of fields, including illustrations and maps of major world cities, the flags of various nations, a map comparing the lengths of major world rivers, a diagram comparing the heights of the World's tallest mountains, a table noting the distance of various countries from Tokyo in Japanese ri (里), an illustration to exhibit geographic terminology, and much more.

A Blurred Glimpse of Texas

Among the notable features of this map is its inclusion of a representation of the flag of the short-lived Republic of Texas. This appears among the flags at the bottom, third row down, twelfth from the right. The student of the Republic will point out that the flag is incorrect - it is a conflation of the  1835-39 flag (which had multiple red and white bars, and one white star in a blue field in the upper left corner) and the 1839 flag (later adopted as the State flag), with one red and white field to the right and a blue field covering the whole left side. Happily, each of the flags is labeled in Japanese.  Thus, the flag to its left, that of Chile, is identified as such:(旗利智). The pronunciation of the kanji is included next to them in kana (チリ). The flag representing Texas is also labeled, in both kanji (旗撒德) and the relevant kana (テキサス).

Japan Branching Out into the World

This map was produced during a period when Japan had already launched a dramatic modernization drive and was engaging more in global affairs. Many of the reforms of the early Meiji were deeply unpopular, but most elites recognized that the old ways could not persist if Japan were to escape Western hegemony. In order to learn as much as possible as quickly as possible, students and study groups were sent abroad by the government, while information from abroad was imported and translated for domestic consumption. While Japan had not been entirely closed off during the Tokugawa era, as is often assumed, the early Meiji era still represented an accelerated crash course in the latest methods and knowledge from abroad in all manner of sciences, including cartography, geography, and navigation. But some remnants of the pre-Meiji era can be witnessed here; for example, Ichikawa and the publisher Mizuochi are both noted as 'commoners' (平民), a Tokugawa-era social classification that had nominally been eliminated at the beginning of the Meiji period.

Meiji Cartographic Art

Stylistically, this map represents an example of the distinctive Meiji-era (1868 - 1912) cartographic tradition - wherein western-style cartographic standards, lithographic printing, and imported inks were combined with Ukiyo-e color traditions and aesthetic values. This map falls in a cartographic lineage that began with the Meiji Restoration in 1868 and continued through about 1895. The new style was often employed by upstart printers seeking to unseat long-established printing houses. Such maps began to fall out of fashion near the turn of the century, when they were supplanted by more reserved printed color.

Cartographers

Ichikawa Raijirō (市川来次郎; fl. c. 1876 - 1893) was an editor, cartographer, and publisher of the early Meiji period based in Tokyo. His known works are quite limited - aside from an impressive world map, he also published several illustrated works (画譜, gafu) of the sort that were popular in the Meiji era.   Further Details...

Mizuochi Chūjirō (水落忠次郎; fl. c. 1868 - 1911) was a publisher of the Meiji era based in Kyōbashi, Tokyo. His works were quite few in number and spread out chronologically, but mostly date from the late 1880s and early 1890s, including at least two printings of Ichikawa Raijirō's impressive world map (新訂萬國地圖) and maps of Japan by Kanō Morifushi (狩野守節) and Miyawaki Tsūkaku (宮脇通赫).   Further Details...

Meguro Jūrō (目黒十郎; fl. c. 1877 - 1936) was a publisher and bookseller based in Tokyo. In addition to maps of the world and Japan, it published works in several fields, especially those relating to pedagogy and language education.   Further Details...

Condition

Good. Light wear along original folds. Some loss along folds and at junctions of folds. Several tears professionally repaired. Ink splotch (perhaps intentional) over the American Southwest and Baja Peninsula.

References

OCLC 21788979 (1876 edition).