Suminokura Soan
Suminokura Soan was a red seal ship trader and prominent figure otherwise in late 16th to early 17th century Kyoto. The son of Suminokura Ryôi, he took over the family's overseas trading operations in 1609, and also played a key role in a number of his father's riverine projects in and around Kyoto.
Soan accompanied his father on annual trading journeys to Tonkin (northern Vietnam) beginning in 1603. In addition to trading in goods, the pair acted as official messengers, conveying formal letters between Japanese and Vietnamese rulers or authorities.[1] In 1609, Ryôi survived a shipwreck on a return journey from Annam (southern Vietnam]] and that same year turned over operations to Soan.
Soan was also actively involved in riverine projects, alongside his father. Beginning around 1600, the Suminokura were ordered by Tokugawa Ieyasu to organize bands of corvée laborers to clear sections of various rivers.[2] Soan then also aided his father in projects along the Hozugawa and Katsuragawa, making it easier to transport lumber from the Arashiyama area, as well as projects expanding or opening waterways for carrying goods from Fushimi up to Kyoto proper, including the Takasegawa canal, completed in 1611. Even after his father's death in 1614, Soan deepened his relationship with the Tokugawa shogunate, and oversaw the operation or expansion of waterways for kashosen passenger ferries along the Yodogawa.
Soan was also engaged in intellectual and cultural pursuits. He studied Neo-Confucianism and waka poetry under Fujiwara Seika, and had interactions with figures such as Hon'ami Kôetsu and Tawaraya Sôtatsu. Soan is perhaps especially known for conceiving and overseeing the production of Saga-bon, books of literature or of Noh plays printed with moveable type carved from wood. These were some of the first books to ever be printed in Japan, preceding the later Edo period explosion of woodblock publishing. A Saga-bon edition of the Tale of Ise printed in 1608 is often cited as the first book with inserted illustrations to be printed in Japan.
Though the Suminokura family cemetery, including the grave of his father Ryôi, is located at Nison-in temple in the Arashiyama area of Kyoto, Soan, after falling ill, decided that he wished to die and be buried at the nearby temple Adashino Nenbutsu-ji instead. A sign erected by Kyoto City stands today in the bamboo grove of that temple, marking the rough location of Soan's grave.
References
- Plaque on-site at grave of Suminokura Soan, Adashino Nenbutsu-ji, Kyoto.
