Portrait

This painting portrays a man wearing a hakama (formal men’s divided skirt), having a folding fan in his right hand and the scabbard of a sword in his left hand, with his mouth tightly closed, raised eyebrows, double eyelids and a large earlobe. It makes the viewer wonder who he might be. Behind the man, there is an armillary sphere, used for observation of the position and movements of celestial bodies. Back in 1795 before the painting was created, the shogunate that intended to reform the calendar system, taking into consideration the Western astronomy, and invited astronomers and or historians who studied astronomy in relation to calendar-making. This person must have been one of them.