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A gold lacquer metal-inlaid seven-case inro By the Kajikawa Family and Ishiguro Masayoshi, 19th century image 1
A gold lacquer metal-inlaid seven-case inro By the Kajikawa Family and Ishiguro Masayoshi, 19th century image 2
A gold lacquer metal-inlaid seven-case inro By the Kajikawa Family and Ishiguro Masayoshi, 19th century image 3
A gold lacquer metal-inlaid seven-case inro By the Kajikawa Family and Ishiguro Masayoshi, 19th century image 4
Lot 235

A gold lacquer metal-inlaid seven-case inro
By the Kajikawa Family and Ishiguro Masayoshi, 19th century

The Edward Wrangham Collection of Japanese Art: Part III
15 May 2012, 10:30 BST
London, New Bond Street

£4,000 - £6,000

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A gold lacquer metal-inlaid seven-case inro

By the Kajikawa Family and Ishiguro Masayoshi, 19th century
Of upright form, bearing a mura-nashiji ground, decorated with the kachi-kachi yama legend, inlaid in gold, shakudo, copper, shibuichi and pewter takazogan with a rabbit standing triumphantly towards the prow of his boat, about to strike with an oar the tanuki who clings onto a sinking barge, the reverse with the full moon inlaid in silver takazogan, rising above the turbulent sea and the interior of rich gyobu; signed for the lacquer Kajikawa saku with red pot seal Ei and for the metalwork, Masayoshi with kakihan within a rectangular gold reserve; with black glass ojime, unsigned. 8.8cm (3½in).

Footnotes

兎に狸（かちかち山）図蒔絵貼付彫金印籠　銘「梶川作　榮（壺印）」「政美（書判）」　19世紀

Provenance: Gretchen Kroch Kelsch collection.
Purchased from Eskenazi Ltd., London, 1987.
Wrangham collection, no.1839.

The kachi-kachi yama story is one of the few Japanese folktales in which a badger (tanuki) is the villain rather than the boisterous, corpulent alcoholic. The episode depicted here is when the tanuki challenged the rabbit to a life and death contest to prove who was the better creature. They were each to build a boat and race across a lake in them. The rabbit carved its boat out of a fallen tree trunk, but the foolish tanuki made a boat of mud. At first, the two competitors were evenly matched, but the badger's mud boat began to dissolve in the middle of the lake and instead of saving the badger, the rabbit strikes him with an oar, and proclaimed his friendship with the innocent human couple whom the wicked badger had earlier inflicted its horrible deeds - thus revealing his revenge.

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