Decorated in gold, silver and red hiramaki-e, takamaki-e, togidashi, kimpun, kirikane, and keuchi on a roiro ground, depicting Prince Genji dressed in court robes and a courtier's hat (eboshi) entering the garden of Yugao through a wicker gate, the lady kneels on the verandah overlooking a garden, fundame with hirame interiors and risers, fundame rims
7.5 cm. (3 in.) high

Eskenazi Ltd., Japanese Inro and Lacquer-ware from a Private Swedish Collection, (London, 1996), no. 42, p. 44-45.

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Lot Essay

The scene illustrated is from the fourth chapter of the Tale of Genji (Genji monogatari) titled Yugao: The Twilight Beauty. Dressed in court robes and a courtier’s hat (eboshi), Prince Genji approaches through the wicker gate of the lady Yugao’s residence. Genji remarks on the worn and dilapidated state of her home, noting a gourd vine (yugao) clambering up the brushwood fence. The drama of the chapter begins when the mysterious lady Yugao sends Genji a fan to accompany some yugao flowers she sees him picking outside her gate. The fan is perfumed and inscribed with a poem mentioning the flowers from the title. The prince composes a reply matching the design on the inro:

‘Let me then draw near and see whether you are she, whom glimmering dusk
Gave me faintly to discern in twilight beauty flowers”¹

1. Royall Tyler (trans.), The Tale of Genji (London, 2001), p. 57.