is an anonymous wooden sculpture from the

13th In music or music theory, a thirteenth is the note thirteen scale degrees from the root of a chord and also the interval between the root and the thirteenth. The interval can be also described as a compound sixth, spanning an octave pl ...

or 14th centuries presumably depicting

Minamoto no Yoritomo was the founder and the first shogun of the Kamakura shogunate of Japan, ruling from 1192 until 1199.Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "Minamoto no Yoriie" in . He was the husband of Hōjō Masako who acted as regent (''shikken'') after his ...

, now part of the collection of the

Tokyo National Museum The or TNM is an art museum in Ueno Park in the Taitō ward of Tokyo, Japan. It is one of the four museums operated by the National Institutes for Cultural Heritage ( :ja:国立文化財機構), is considered the oldest national museum in Japan, ...

(1147–1199) was the founder and the first ''

shōgun , officially , was the title of the military dictators of Japan during most of the period spanning from 1185 to 1868. Nominally appointed by the Emperor, shoguns were usually the de facto rulers of the country, though during part of the Kamak ...

'' of the

Kamakura Shogunate The was the feudal military government of Japan during the Kamakura period from 1185 to 1333. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Kamakura-jidai''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia'', p. 459. The Kamakura shogunate was established by Minamoto no ...

of Japan. He ruled from 1192 until 1199.Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "Minamoto no Yoritomo" in . It is generally agreed that the sculpture might be an image of him, but this attribution is not completely certain. Dated from the

Kamakura period The is a period of Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura by the first ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo after the conclusion of the Genpei War, which saw the struggle bet ...

(1185-1333), it is believed that this sculpture was enshrined in the

Tsurugaoka Hachimangū is the most important Shinto shrine in the city of Kamakura, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. The shrine is a cultural center of the city of Kamakura and serves as the venue of many of its most important festivals with two museums. For most of its ...

Shinto shrine in Kamakura, a place of worship strongly linked to the Minamoto family. It is also said that when

Toyotomi Hideyoshi , otherwise known as and , was a Japanese samurai and ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) of the late Sengoku period regarded as the second "Great Unifier" of Japan.Richard Holmes, The World Atlas of Warfare: Military Innovations that Changed the Cour ...

visited the shrine, he talked to the sculpture of Yoritomo while patting it on its shoulder. Two other very similar sculptures are preserved in Kamakura, an image of

Hōjō Tokiyori Hōjō Tokiyori (, June 29, 1227 – December 24, 1263) was the fifth shikken (regent) of the Kamakura shogunate in Japan. Early life He was born to warrior monk Hōjō Tokiuji and a daughter of Adachi Kagemori. Rule Tokiyori became shikken f ...

Kenchō-ji Kenchō-ji (建長寺) is a Rinzai Zen Zen ( zh, t=禪, p=Chán; ja, text= 禅, translit=zen; ko, text=선, translit=Seon; vi, text=Thiền) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty, known as the ...

, and an image of Uesugi Shigefusa at

Meigetsu-in is a Rinzai Zen temple of the Kenchō-ji school in Kita-Kamakura, Kanagawa, Japan. Famous for its hydrangeas, it's also known as ''The Temple of Hydrangeas'' (ajisai-dera). The main object of worship is goddess Shō Kannon (聖観音). Histor ...

. The style of these sculptures probably followed the popular portraits of court nobles in their "starched stiff clothing" and cross-legged position. The portrait of Yoritomo seems to have been created some time after the other two, probably close to a century after Yoritomo's death. A smaller-than-life portrait, with a height of about 70 cm from the bottom to the top of the ''eboshi'', the typical headgear used by court nobles, it has been praised for its "solemnity"English display at the TNM and for "showing the noble dignity of the head of a warrior family". It is designated an Important Cultural Property. It is now part of the collection of the

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

, where it is kept and exhibited occasionally. The last time it was on display was from July 25 to October 22, 2017, in Room 11 of the Honkan (Japanese Gallery).

References

External links

{{Commons category, Seated Portrait of Minamoto no Yoritomo (Tokyo National Museum)
Website of the sculpture (Tokyo National Museum) Website of the sculpture (National Institutes for Cultural Heritage)
Wooden sculptures in Japan Important Cultural Properties of Japan Sculptures of the Tokyo National Museum