Skip Navigation

Silk-Goods Lane, Odenma-cho, No. 74 from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo

Utagawa Hiroshige

Asian Art

Here we see a boisterous procession of carpenters, among the most powerful artisans in Edo, a city built of wood. To the left is the great dry-goods house of Daimaru, in the prosperous district of Ōdenma-chō, suggesting the interlocked fortunes of Edo merchants and Edo builders. The shop sign to the upper left bears the slogan "Cash payment, prices as marked." This practice, established in Japan as early as 1683, broke down the traditional class-based relationships between seller and buyer, making all customers equal.

MEDIUM Woodblock print
  • Place Made: Japan
  • DATES 7th month of 1858
    PERIOD Edo Period, Ansei Era
    DIMENSIONS sheet: 14 3/16 x 9 1/4 in. (36.0 x 23.5 cm); image: 13 3/8 x 8 3/4 in. (34.0 x 22.2 cm)  (show scale)
    MARKINGS No publisher's seal visible, probably lost when left margin was trimmed.
    SIGNATURE Hiroshige-ga
    COLLECTIONS Asian Art
    ACCESSION NUMBER 30.1478.74
    CREDIT LINE Gift of Anna Ferris
    CATALOGUE DESCRIPTION This boisterous procession is called "sending off the master carpenter" (toryo-okuri) and it followed the ridgepole-raising ceremony for a new building. Since most of the structures in Edo were built of wood, fires were frequent, rebuilding was constant, and the carpenters were among the most powerful artisans in the city. The ceremony lasted several hours, beginning with rituals conducted by a Shinto priest on a platform atop the roof of the newly framed structure, on which the symbolic items, seen here on a pole, were displayed. This sacred pole has cloth strips of five colors, paper "gohei" above, in between three fans with the rising sun symbol surrounding a mirror, below women's hair accessories, said to be symbolic of the sacrifice of a young maiden at the beginning of a large building project. Next came two ceremonial "exorcising arrows," and on the arrows are mounted large carvings of the crane and the tortoise, symbols of long life. The chief carpenter is leading the procession and he is followed by the construction bosses, each in mock samurai ceremonial dress. After the rituals, the homeowner provided a banquet with plenty of drink. The marchers, seen with open mouths, are singing a work song. In this prosperous district of Odenma-cho, at left, is the well-known dry goods store Daimaru. The storefront of Daimaru is shown in careful detail, suggesting the idea of mutual prosperity. Daimaru was a branch of a Kyoto establishment, founded in 1717 by Shimomura Hikouemon (whose family name appears on the sign here) and expanded to Edo in 1743. The shop sign to the upper left says "cash payment prices as marked"; marking fixed prices on merchandise was a practice first established in Japan as early as 1683 and Daimaru followed competitively. It has been said that fixed pricing made all customers equal and that an egalitarian mass society had begun to emerge in Edo far earlier than anywhere else in the world. Today Daimaru continues to thrive at its new location, right over the east entrance of Tokyo Station.
    MUSEUM LOCATION This item is not on view
    CAPTION Utagawa Hiroshige (Japanese, 1797-1858). Silk-Goods Lane, Odenma-cho, No. 74 from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo, 7th month of 1858. Woodblock print, sheet: 14 3/16 x 9 1/4 in. (36.0 x 23.5 cm);. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Anna Ferris, 30.1478.74 (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 30.1478.74_PS20.jpg)
    IMAGE overall, 30.1478.74_PS20.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph, 2023
    "CUR" at the beginning of an image file name means that the image was created by a curatorial staff member. These study images may be digital point-and-shoot photographs, when we don\'t yet have high-quality studio photography, or they may be scans of older negatives, slides, or photographic prints, providing historical documentation of the object.
    RIGHTS STATEMENT No known copyright restrictions
    This work may be in the public domain in the United States. Works created by United States and non-United States nationals published prior to 1923 are in the public domain, subject to the terms of any applicable treaty or agreement. You may download and use Brooklyn Museum images of this work. Please include caption information from this page and credit the Brooklyn Museum. If you need a high resolution file, please fill out our online application form (charges apply). The Museum does not warrant that the use of this work will not infringe on the rights of third parties, such as artists or artists' heirs holding the rights to the work. It is your responsibility to determine and satisfy copyright or other use restrictions before copying, transmitting, or making other use of protected items beyond that allowed by "fair use," as such term is understood under the United States Copyright Act. The Brooklyn Museum makes no representations or warranties with respect to the application or terms of any international agreement governing copyright protection in the United States for works created by foreign nationals. For further information about copyright, we recommend resources at the United States Library of Congress, Cornell University, Copyright and Cultural Institutions: Guidelines for U.S. Libraries, Archives, and Museums, and Copyright Watch. For more information about the Museum's rights project, including how rights types are assigned, please see our blog posts on copyright. If you have any information regarding this work and rights to it, please contact copyright@brooklynmuseum.org.
    RECORD COMPLETENESS
    Not every record you will find here is complete. More information is available for some works than for others, and some entries have been updated more recently. Records are frequently reviewed and revised, and we welcome any additional information you might have.