1790

Kansei 2 (寛政二年)

Timeline of 1790

• 1790/2/19 Workhouses called ninsoku yoseba open at Ishikawajima in Edo.
• 1790/5 The Kansei reforms are promulgated further, imposing new regulations on publishing.
  • Includes bans on books containing unorthodox ideas, those produced under pseudonyms, and those written in kana and based on "baseless rumors", along with those books and prints depicting current events in the guise of historical tales. Extravagant objects with "rhetorical flourishes" are likewise banned.
  • Single-sheet prints must now contain not only the names of designer (artist) and publisher, but also a kiwame censors' seal.
• 1790/10 The regulations on publishing of the Fifth Month are re-promulgated.
• 1790/10/6 The neighborhood heads in Edo are divided into seventeen groups.
• 1790/11 The system by which publishers appointed representatives (gyôji) to serve as censors is extended to the makers of prints and picturebooks, where previously only publishers of books containing prose had to appoint gyôji. Booklenders and wholesalers are now also required to have their merchandise inspected.

Other Events of 1790

• The Nakasu entertainment district in Edo is dismantled, and the normal flow of the Sumida River restored.
• The shogunate closes over forty illegal pleasure districts in Edo.
• Maruyama Ôkyo and his students take part in renovation efforts at the Imperial Palace.
• The Qianlong Emperor invites troupes to perform for his 80th birthday. The birth of Beijing opera, or jingju, is traced to this occasion.
• The first Japanese trading post on Sakhalin is established.

Births and Deaths

• Painter Kanô Eisen'in Michinobu dies (b. 1730).
• Ukiyo-e artist Keisai Eisen is born (d. 1848).
• Kabuki actor Nakamura Nakazô I dies (b. 1736).
• King Sunjo of Korea is born (d. 1834).

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