大阪歴史博物館　Osaka Museum of History

This folding screen depicts a yokozuna grand champion named Tanikaze Kajinosuke and other leading sumo wrestlers active around 1788. This picture is said to be a realistic portrayal of sumo wrestlers of the day—we can see some sumo wrestlers wearing two swords and others wearing a short sword only, and can identify Kashiwado Kandayu, known as a one-eyed sumo wrestler.

This tachi sword was made by Gassan Sadatoshi, a master swordsmith and holder of the title of intangible cultural property of Nara Prefecture, in response to the request of the group of supporters of Hakuho Sho in Tokushima Prefecture, the hometown of his wife. The sword is characterized by the elegant straight temper line forged on ayasugihada (wavy grain pattern), a surface pattern typical of the Gassan School, and the forging pattern and temper pattern along the blade edge contribute to its delicate beauty.

This is one of the few nishiki-e depicting Osaka Sumo matches. We can see flags with place names such as Utsubo, Dojimahama, and Zakoba erected in the upper part of the spectators’ area. One of the flags has ichiba written on it, which means “market,” indicating that there were huge markets, such as a dried sardine market, rice market and fish market, in the places shown on these flags. In this sense, this nishiki-e suggests a close association between the markets and Osaka Sumo.