The Actor Nakamura Utaemon IV as the Wrestler Iwakawa Jirokichi

Shunbaisai Hokuei 春梅斎北英 Japanese

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The flamboyantly garbed sumo wrestler, played by the famous Utaemon IV, is drawn from a scene of the Kabuki play The Rise of the One Thousand Ryō Wrestler (Sekitori senryō nobori). Yet the character was not competing in a normal sumo match, but rather one held by patrons of two rival wrestlers, each of whom hoped to raise enough money to ransom a courtesan from an Osaka brothel.

The Actor Nakamura Utaemon IV as the Wrestler Iwakawa Jirokichi, Shunbaisai Hokuei 春梅斎北英 (Japanese, active 1829–1837, died 1837), Woodblock print; ink and color on paper; vertical ōban, Japan

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