Although constructed in the traditional sixteenth-century gusoku (complete set) fashion, this is actually an example of the revival of earlier armor styles during the Edo period. It was part of the large collection of Japanese arms and armor formed by Arms and Armor Department founding curator Bashford Dean around 1900, during his extended stays in Japan for scientific research. The armor was included in the Metropolitan Museum's 1903 loan exhibition of Japanese arms and armor from Dean's private collection, which the Museum purchased in 1904.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Armor (Gusoku)
Date:19th century
Culture:Japanese
Medium:Iron, leather, lacquer, silk, copper alloy
Dimensions:as mounted, approx.: H. 77 in. (195.6 cm); W. 26 in. (66 cm); D. 16 1/2 in. (41.9 cm)
Classification:Armor for Man
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1904
Object Number:04.4.2
Ex coll.: Bashford Dean, New York.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries," November 14, 1970–June 1, 1971.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Bashford Dean and the Creation of the Arms and Armor Department," October 2, 2012–October 13, 2014.
Dean, Bashford, and The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Catalogue of the Loan Collection of Japanese Armor. Hand-book (Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, N.Y.)). New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1903. p. 47, fig. 14.
Grancsay, Stephen V. "A New Gallery of Japanese Arms and Armor." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, 27 pp. 66–68, ill.
Rankin, Major Robert T. "The Arms and Armor of Feudal Japan." Hobbies 56 pp. 141–43, ill.
Grancsay, Stephen V. "The New Galleries of Oriental Arms and Armor." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin (May 1958), pp. 254–255, ill. p. 255 and cover.
Grancsay, Stephen V. "The Japanese Armour Gallery in the Metropolitan Museum of Art." The Connoisseur (September 1961), opp. p. 10 (ill. in color).
Boger, Batterson H. The Traditional Arts of Japan: A Complete Illustrated Guide. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1964. pp. 108–109, ill.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Kenneth Clark. Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1970. p. 247, no. 261, ill.
Nickel, Helmut. Ullstein-Waffenbuch: eine kulturhistorische Waffenkunde mit Markenverzeichnis. Berlin: Ullstein, 1974. p. 132, ill.
Grancsay, Stephen V., and Stuart W. Pyhrr. Arms & Armor: Essays by Stephen V. Grancsay from the Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 1920–1964. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1986. pp. 99–101, fig. 36.1.
Barnhart, Richard M. Asia, edited by John P. O'Neill. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987. p 31, p. 30 illus., color; p. 31. backview, cat. no. 11.
Pyhrr, Stuart W. "Of Arms and Men: Arms and Armor at the Metropolitan, 1912–2012." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin (Summer 2012), pp. 11–12, figs. 12–13.
Byck, John, and Edward Hunter. Japanese Arms and Armor from the Collection of Etsuko and John Morris. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2018. p. 7, ill.
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