Detail View: David Rumsey Historical Map Collection: 地球精圖. [Chikyū seizu / Earth Cartography].

Urabe, Seiichi [部精一]

1874

地球精圖. [Chikyū seizu / Earth Cartography].

Nakano Keizō

Osaka

Separate Map

61

106

World

Mountains; Rivers

地球精圖. [Chikyū seizu / Earth Cartography].

15001.000

Urabe, Seiichi [部精一]

1874

地球精圖. [Chikyū seizu / Earth Cartography].

: National Diet Library (Tokyo): YG913-3; Stamford University Library: G1019 .U73 1874; University of California-Berkeley Library: East Asian Rare A 23.; OCLC: 21789046.

"A very rare and highly attractive Early Meiji Era Japanese double hemisphere World Map, a lovely ‘boutique’ production by the cartographer, painter and calligrapher Urabe Seiichi, printed in Osaka by Nakano Keizō, a product of the intense contemporary interest that the Japanese people held for the outside world, printed on blueish-grey paper with fine original hand colouring. This very rare, large format Japanese World map was drafted by the cartographer, painter and calligrapher Urabe Seiichi, and was published in Osaka by the printer Nakano Keizō. Based upon a Western model, the map was a product of the contemporary intense fascination that the Japanese people held for the outside world during the Meiji Era, as the country dramatically abandoned its traditional policy of isolation. The world is projected in double hemispheres, with each country bathed in its own beautiful hue of original wash hand colour. All major cities are labelled, while large rivers are delineated, mountain ranges are expressed through hachures, while the directions of the ocean currents can be seen in the seas. The map also labels some newly completed key infrastructure that had revolutionized global transport and communications. This includes major railways (such as the transcontinental line in North America, from New York to San Francisco (completed in 1869), as well as key maritime telegraph cables, such as the Transatlantic line (completed in 1866) and the cable that ran from England down through the Mediterranean and the Red Sea and then over to India and Singapore (completed in 1870). On the map’s corners are four hemispheric views, while in the upper margin are diagrams showing the relative heights of the world’s great mountains and the lengths of major rivers. Urabe Seiichi, based in Osaka, is recoded as being active through the 1870s, and was primarily a painter and calligrapher, although he also made a few maps of Japan. A Note on Rarity The present map is very rare ‘boutique’ production, seemingly published in only a small print run, likely for the local Osaka market. Moreover, the survival rate of such large separately issued maps is very low. We can trace only 3 institutional examples of the map, held by the National Diet Library (Tokyo), Stamford University Library, and the University of California-Berkeley Library. We are not aware of any other examples as having appeared on the market. The Meiji Era: Japan Opens up to the World Even during the Tokugawa Era (1603 - 1868), or Shogunate, when Japan pursued an official policy of national isolation, Japanese academics and officials still maintained an interest in world geography, although their knowledge tended to be limited to whatever sources they were able to acquire from the Dutch who were generally the only foreigners allowed to visit the country. The Shogun’s Calendar Bureau (also referred to as the Department of Astronomy) was the official agency responsible for the study and regulation of matters of geography and the celestial world, supplying the government with maps and making astronomical observations that could be used to determine the timing of festivals, etc. A breakthrough in the Japanese knowledge of world geography was their decision to create the first Japanese official world map, Shintei bankoku zenzu (dated 1810, but published in 1816), made under the direction of the geographer Takahashi Kageyasu. The map was predicated upon fine but, in some cases, dated Western sources, but nevertheless gave the Shogunate a decent working knowledge of the outside world. Due the country’s continued isolation the regime saw no need to replace the map, as least for some decades. The American intervention in Japan, coming in the form of Commodore Perry’s 1853 visit, compelled the country to open itself up to international trade. This event shocked the Japanese establishment, forcing them to adapt to the new reality that continued isolationism was not an option. With alacrity Japanese officials sought to gain the best knowledge of foreign lands. The publication of the Yamaji Yukitaka and Shibata Shūzō’s world map, 重訂万国全図 [Jutei bankoku zenzu / Complete Map of All Countries] 1855 (Ansei 2 / 1855), which was reissued with revisions in Meiji 4 (1871), was considered a tour de force by the Japanese establishment. During the 1860s, the Shogunate fell, to be replaced by the Meiji regime (1868 - 1912), an activist, modernizing government responsible directly to the emperor. While the old order reluctantly interacted with the outside world, the Meiji enthusiastically embraced foreign affairs, leading the country on the most radical and rapid socio-economic transformation of any place in world history, before or since. The Meiji years saw Japan go from an isolated agrarian society into a hyper-industrialized, ultra-modern military state, and a great player in global trade. The academic establishment in the Meiji Era thirsted for experience of foreign lands, and immense strides were made in geographic knowledge and mapmaking. The present map is a stellar example of how the Japanese cartographic and globalization revolution transcended Tokyo and was experienced in all major cities in the country (in this case Osaka), and it grants a stellar insight into how contemporary Japanese people viewed their planet. " (Alexander Johnson and Dasa Pahor, 2022)

15001.000

Separate Map

61

106

15001000.jp2

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Urabe, Seiichi [部精一]