Crowds Visiting the Shrine of Benzaitenat Enoshima

Printerprinted by Utagawa Hiroshige I 歌川広重 (Japanese, 1797–1858)

Date1851

Mediumink and color on paper

Dimensions35.6 x 76.2 cm (14 x 30 in.)

ClassificationsPrints

Credit LineJohn Chandler Bancroft Collection

Terms

Object number1901.1158

Label TextHiroshige’s triptych has four groups of female pilgrims arriving at the causeway to Enoshima, where every six years one of the island temples displays treasures related to Benzaiten, the goddess of wealth and music. Here, members of amateur singing groups carry paper parasols with emblems of the four main schools of Edo narrative chanting. Though the round trip took two or three days and often included visits to other area shrines and temples, Enoshima was a popular destination for pilgrims from Edo. Enoshima Island’s shrine to Benzaiten, the Buddhist goddess of wealth, good fortune, and music, was consecrated in 1182 on the orders of Minamoto no Yoritomo (1147-1199), who later became the founder and the first shogun of the Kamakura shogunate of Japan (1192-1199). The site remained a popular place for pilgrimage throughout the Edo period (1603-1868). Perhaps because Benzaiten was the only female deity among a group of deities known as the Seven Gods of Fortune, or because of her connection to music, Hiroshige chose to show four groups of women proceeding to the shrine, the emblems on the women’s parasols associating them with different schools of narrative chanting in Edo. The triptych is notable for its forced perspective, which allowed Hiroshige to portray the landscape naturalistically as well as capture the individual features of the figures in the foreground.

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