Shinsen Jinbutsu: Orikata Tehon Chūshingura, Jūichi-dan (New Selection of Figures: Models of Paper Folding for the Eleven Acts of the Chūshingura); Chūshingura Orikata Denjū-gaki (Instructions on How to Fold the Chūshingura)

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Shinsen Jinbutsu: Orikata Tehon Chūshingura, Jūichi-dan ["New Selection of Figures: Models of Paper Folding for the Eleven Acts of the Chūshingura"]; Chūshingura Orikata Denjū-gaki ["Instructions on How to Fold the Chūshingura"]

[Tsuyama, Yūzō (attributed to)].

Ōsaka: Konomura Hikosuke, [ca. Meiji period (1870-1890s)]. 

A set of two sheets providing instructions on how to fold 25 origami figures from the eleven acts of the kabuki kyōgen play Kanadehon Chūshingura. One of the prints, Chūshingura Orikata Denjū-gaki, describes and shows how to fold the origami characters from the play, while the other, Shinsen Jinbutsu: Orikata Tehon Chūshingura, Jūichi-dan, shows the finished origami characters against backdrops representative of the different acts. The latter print was probably based on a work of the same title produced around 1800 and may be linked to the first printed book on origami, Hiden Senbazuru Orikata ("Secret to Folding One-Thousand Cranes", 1797). Karen Latchana Kenney describes the Edo edition of the Orikata Tehon Chūshingura as a work recording "the first very simple paper-folding instructions". The set of instructions is notable in that all of the characters pictured can be folded from the same six-step base pictured on the right side of the print. A Meiji edition of an important early work on origami, believed to have been printed with the original Edo period woodblocks. All printings scarce. 

Two leaves, each woodblock-printed on one side, both reinforced with inscribed (used) washi paper to verso. Foxing, marks, browning, light stains, and creases. Ex-ownership inscription to right margin of one print. Character faces hand-applied to the same print. Small losses to extremities and to crease intersections of both prints. The Meiji edition of the set may have been published with an envelope, which is not present with this set. Prints approx. 31.5 x 43 cm.

❧ Kenney, Karen Latchana. Folding Tech: Using Origami and Nature to Revolutionize Technology, 2020. 

❧ https://www.arc.ritsumei.ac.jp/lib/vm/en-akochushingura/2023/11/c441.html

Shinsen Jinbutsu: Orikata Tehon Chūshingura, Jūichi-dan (New Selection of Figures: Models of Paper Folding for the Eleven Acts of the Chūshingura); Chūshingura Orikata Denjū-gaki (Instructions on How to Fold the Chūshingura)
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