FY2020 Annual Report for International Joint Research with Research Fund（様式）International Joint Digital Archiving Center for Japanese Art and Culture (ARC-iJAC),Art Research Center, Ritsumeikan University
Date (year/mm/dd): 2021-4-26
1. Title of the Research Project

Edo Period Map goes Digital
The O Edo ezu as an Interactive Resource
2. Research Leader
Name

Organization and title

Michael KinskiFrankfurt University, Institute of Japanese Studies,Professor

4. Overview of the Research Project (About 150 words) Note: If you have changed your project since the time of
application submission, please write clearly where you made changes.
This project featured the creation an interactive map of Edo in the 1830s by using the On Edo ezu* map and linking
it with woodblock print illustrations of Edo. It was realized in a teaching project for undergraduate students incooperation and with the support of two programmers who are at the same time graduate students in the last stagesof their Master’s program.
•••

The project uses the On Edo ezu (1830–43), a full-scale map of Edo to be found in the ARC archive, as
point of departure. While this provided us with a basis for our creation, we used different sets of coloured
woodblock prints by Utagawa Hiroshige showing famous scenic spots of Edo to incorporate visual
information on certain areas and pinpoint them on the map.
The user will be able to steer through the map and use the mouse cursor to click on these highlighted
famous spots to see how artists such as Hiroshige (cf. links on last slide) visualized these places and how
Edo period consumers who had bought such prints might have visualized them before their inner eye.
Information on these places drawn from research materials as well as internet resources or from Edo period
guide books such as the Tôto saijiki 東都歳事記 will help the modern user to get an impression of how
the Edo period owner of such a map might have visualized it or what he or she might have read about
various spots in a travel guide.

* On the ARC homepage the map is listed as O Edo ezu. Since the explanatory remarks on the map itself use thereading On Edo ezu, this reading is adopted in this report.
5. Overview of the Research Results Note: We may use this section for the Center’s PR.
The On Edo ezu 御江戸絵図, a map of Edo printed in the 1840s (in a higher resolution kindly provided by its owner)
was uploaded to the DemiScript platform (developed by Koray Birenheide at Frankfurt University, JapaneseStudies) in order to make full use of the platforms in-depth zoom funcionality. Further programming ensured thatthe map can be moved along the x and the y axis and that it can be rotated. Both features make for greater versatility
in navigating the map.
In a second step, the project’s student participants identified the “famous places” shown on Utagawa Hiroshige’s
print series Shinsen Edo meisho 新撰江戸名所, Edo meisho 江戸名所, Edo meisho no uchi 江戸名所之内, and Edo
meisho mittsu no nagame 江戸名所三ツの眺め. Although almost all students did not have training in reading kana ofkanji as used in early modern Japanese publications they were able to locate all objects and mark them up. For thispurpose, they classified the meisho according to functionality (Buddhist temple, Shintoist shrine, pleasure quarterand so on) or geographical features (river, hill) with a specific colours for each of the seven group of objects. Aslider allows either to hide the mark ups or to diminish the opacity of the map itself.

（様式）The main task, however, lay in writing a detailed article for each of the localities found on the map. Wherever
possible these contained Hiroshige’s print as well as depictions in other coloured woodblock prints. With a focus
on the history of the meisho as well as their place in contemporary imagination, culture, or religious belief. In anumber of cases special attention was paid to the motifs in Hiroshige’s prints in order to bring to life the scenes
chosen by the artist as representations of the “famous places”, and to integrate the motifs in contemporary city life.
Modern geospatial data and information was added as well. The individual articles will open by clicking on theitems highlighted on the map.
It did not come as a surprise that most of Hiroshige’s meisho were located in a circle around the center of the cityproper. However, marking the localities strengthened the impression that most of them were situated in the easternand south eastern parts of Edo – nearest to the areas of town where the largest number of non-samurai residents
lived an led their daily lives. While it is conveivable that the On Edo ezu and other such maps also provided
orientation from visitors from outside they were not in the least a visualization of the symbolic space intimately
connected to the lebenswelt of local residents.
6. Research Activities(1) Books(2) Articles(3) Presentations
・The project will be introduced by Michael Kinski and Koray Birenheide at the European Association ofJapanese Studies conference to be held in August 2021 (hosted by Ghent University, Belgium) via Zoom.
(4) Symposiums and/or research meeting you organized(5) Other research activities (Lectures to the general public, and appearances in/contributions to mass media)(6) Academic awards(7) Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research -KAKENHI(8) Competitive grants other than KAKENHI(9) Other achievements