Page 22 - Bonhams The Zuiun Collection NYC March 2017
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GYOKURYŪSAI 玉龍斎 A BOXWOOD SCEPTER IN LOTUS-ROOT
20 | BONHAMS A hardwood scepter in the form of a skull FORM
and lotus root Japan, Edo period (1615– Japan, Edo period (1615–1868) or Meiji
1868), 19th century era (1868–1912), 19th century
Carved from keyaki (zelkova) wood, in the Realistically carved in the form of a lotus root
form of a long curving segmented lotus root and stem with a single unfurling leaf
with the head in the form of a skull, incised With a wooden tomobako storage box, the
with a poem: Stay on your guard, a lotus- lid inscribed Ōyō (tsuge) renkon-bori okimono
flower root is a muddy stick, playing on the 黄楊蓮根彫 置物 (Boxwood ornament
two meanings of dorobō 泥棒, “muddy stick” carved as a lotus root)
or “thief”; followed by an inscription for the 11 1/2in (29.3cm) long
poem Yōren daioshō ei 涌蓮大和尚詠 (Poem
by the great priest Yōren) and a signature US$1,000 - 1,500
Gyokuryūsai kore o tsukuru 玉龍斎造之
(Made by Gyokuryūsai) 5033
With a modern Japanese wooden storage YOSHITOKI 美時
box A rosewood scepter in reishi-fungus form
20 1/8in (51 1/8cm) long Japan, Taisho (1912–1926) or Showa
(1926–1989) era, circa 1915–1930
US$1,200 - 1,800 A polished shitan (rosewood) scepter carved
in the form of an elongated reishi fungus
Yōren 涌蓮 was a name used by Eryō 慧 with a lizard crawling along its stem, signed
亮 (1719–1774) a priest of the Shinshū toward the base Yoshitoki tō 美時刀 (Carved
sect active first in Edo and later at Saga by Yoshitoki)
near Kyoto who studied poetry with Reizei With a wooden tomobako storage box, the
Tamemura 冷泉為村 and Ozawa Roan 小沢 lid inscribed Shitan nyoi Yoshitoki tō 紫檀如
蘆庵. Gyokuryūsai was listed by pioneering 意 美時刀 (Rosewood scepter carved by
netsuke scholar Ueda Reikichi as being Yoshitoki)
active in the “middle era,” meaning (in Ueda’s 20in (51cm) long
chronology) the early to middle nineteenth
century; see Ueda Reikichi 上田令吉, US$1,800 - 2,200
Netsuke no kenkyū 根付の研究 (A Study of
Netsuke), Osaka, Kanao Bun’endō 金尾文淵
堂, 1943, p. 159 (no. 305).
