This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 4/18/2025
[JAPANESE MANUSCRIPT]. Banpaku Shimoda nyuko kikigaki. [Oral Accounts on Foreign Ships which Entered Shimoda Port.] [Japan, ca. 1856.] Invaluable manuscript chronology of the earliest ships entering the port of Shimoda after the implementation of the Japanese-American treaty which opened up foreign trade with the previously isolationist nation, covering two years from February 1854 to February 1856, presented in the meticulous hand of a contemporary observer who compiled firsthand information as well as his own, together with a manuscript drawing of a Dutch sea captain in naval attire, made by Kitajima Toen. Manuscript: 8vo. 30 pages plus titled cover, string-tied at center of spine with rolled up paper, opening from left to right, measuring approximately 6 ½ x 9 ½". Text is in Japanese, with occasional annotations in red ink. Drawing: Single leaf measuring approximately 9 ½ x 13", titled and signed in manuscript, with red ink stamp. Some creasing and indication of burrowing, otherwise in very good and original condition, clean and bright internally, an invaluable log of the earliest trade activity from the onset of the Convention of Kanagawa. With precise details, the writer keeps a record of vessels from America, Russia and France, arriving at Edo Bay, beginning with the return of Commodore Perry in February 1854 for the signing of what would be the Kanagawa Treaty, and continuing for two full years, featuring descriptions of the ships including dimensions and armament, repairs and supplies procured, captains' names and crew sizes, and their activities in Shimoda. This document is not only an invaluable historical log of the first and most significant foreign vessels to interact with Japan during the formative years of the Unequal Treaties, it may have been used in the Japanese study of foreign ships for their own benefit. Immediately after bowing to the demands of the powerful Western ships and their commanders, an active assimilation of Western technological advances in warships ensued in the Japanese Navy. In 1855 Japan acquired its first steam driven warship, and in 1857 its first screw driven warship. Japanese Naval students were sent abroad to naval schools in England, France, the Netherlands, and the like. By the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate in 1867, its navy would possess eight western-style steam warships.