ANONYMOUS MEIJI ERA, 19TH CENTURY A rare Japanese makimono (handscroll picture) in naive style, the title slip reading Shukke shobo no zu, chu (Pictures of Fire and Firefighting, part 2), the outlines possiby printed and hand-coloured with a continuous scene of fire brigades from different neighbourhoods across the city of Edo (Tokyo), starting with Fukagawa and ending with Sugamo, many carrying banners displaying their crests and with their names and addresses inscribed above, the many figures marching between fires, some firemen fighting the blazes and townspeople running in fear, 26.5cm x 580cm. Provenance: an Irish private collection, Dublin. A copy of a letter from Alfred Haft, Project Curator of the Japanese Section at the British Museum, discussing the scroll is available. It mentions comparable 19th century scroll paintings in the collections of the Edo-Tokyo Museum, and at the British Museum.