Educated Japanese of the time often wrote to one another in Chinese, much as Europeans would write in Latin rather than their own languages. Grandfather's handwriting is elegant, though a bit shaky. He was 76, his grandson about eight. The boy's letter is not in the show. A portrait depicts the Emperor Shomu, one of the earliest imperial connoisseurs, who commissioned the 53-foot statue of Buddha still to be seen in Nara.
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