✦ Japan, Edo period (1615–1868) · 1791
An actor, a costume, a banner
A Japanese theatre print makes identity visible through costume and a carried banner, without becoming a record of an actual military lord.
Gift of Jeptha H. Wade in honor of Emily V. Wade · CC0. Resized without cropping or recolouring.
Enlarge the photograph ↗✦ Photograph-based observations
Whose identity is the image performing?
A figure in broad red clothing holds a long banner and wears swords. Repeated angular devices decorate the garment, while lettering and seals occupy part of the sheet.
The image is a printed representation of a performance figure. The garment’s repeated devices, the banner’s pattern, and the sheet’s inscriptions are distinct witnesses.
What the record tells us
Cleveland identifies the subject as Ichikawa Monnosuke II as a lord holding a banner, gives Katsukawa Shunei as the artist, and dates the colour woodblock print to 1791. The record’s title distinguishes the actor from the role. This study does not independently identify the depicted play or every costume emblem. [1]
✦ Editorial interpretation
What follows from the arrangement?
The catalogue names an actor playing a lord. That distinction matters because a performance can use costume and a banner to make a role recognizable without recording what an actual military lord wore. The performer, represented character, and printed sheet each have their own identity and history. A theatrical source might connect the device with a role or production convention; the print alone does not make that connection. Begin with the catalogue's distinction and use it to decide which historical question the image can answer.
Comparative heraldry benefits from keeping local terminology and context visible. Repeated Japanese costume devices need their own sources rather than automatic translation into European crest, quartering, or coat of arms. The print provides a strong question about performance and recognition; it is not a military inventory or an armorial register.
Claims and their evidence
| Claim | Evidence | Limit |
|---|---|---|
| A figure in broad red clothing holds a long banner and wears swords. Repeated angular devices decorate the garment, while lettering and seals occupy part of the sheet. | Object photograph | Photographed arrangement; not a new dating or bearer identification. |
| 1791; Japan, Edo period (1615–1868). | Museum object record [1] | Catalogue date and attribution, with their stated qualifications. |
| The museum identifies an actor represented in the role of a lord. | Museum object record [1] | The depicted role is not evidence that the actor held that lordship or used the banner in battle. |
✦ Your turn
Explain what supports your conclusion.
Write three captions: the actor, the role, and the physical printed sheet. Assign each visible device or inscription to the appropriate caption. Then explain which additional theatrical source would help identify the banner’s meaning in the performance.
Discuss your answer
A strong answer retains the artist, year, actor, and role as separate facts. It does not make a battlefield record from a stage image or impose a European armorial system upon Japanese devices without evidence. It also treats an uncertain inscription as a transcription problem rather than a guessed name.
Take the research further
Find a specialist theatre-print record or programme that connects this actor, year, and costume with a named play. Compare the banner with another performance image and ask whether its device identifies a character, actor lineage, production convention, or another association.
Return to the related Academy reading ↗Sources and image rights
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Ichikawa Monnosuke II as a Lord Holding a Banner, accession1974.81. Record consulted 2026-10-10. The date above describes the artifact or photograph, not the publication date of this webpage.
- CC0 — image rights. The individual collection record permits this image’s reuse under CC0. Catalogue prose is summarized in our own words. Image credit: Gift of Jeptha H. Wade in honor of Emily V. Wade.
Show the BibTeX citation
@misc{jhheraldry_object-shunei-stage-banner,
author = {{Cleveland Museum of Art}},
title = {Ichikawa Monnosuke II as a Lord Holding a Banner (accession 1974.81)},
howpublished = {\url{https://clevelandart.org/art/1974.81}},
url = {https://clevelandart.org/art/1974.81},
note = {Original-language museum collection record. Accessed 2026-10-10.}
}