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Perhaps the earliest use of Prussian blue in the (greater) Japanese archipelago is evident in a series of maps known as ''[[magiri-zu]]'' produced in the [[Ryukyu Kingdom|Ryûkyû Kingdom]] in [[1737]] to [[1750]].<ref>Gallery labels, ''Ryukyu/Okinawa no chizu ten'', Okinawa Prefectural Museum, Feb 2017.</ref>
Perhaps the earliest use of Prussian blue in the (greater) Japanese archipelago is evident in a series of maps known as ''[[magiri-zu]]'' produced in the [[Ryukyu Kingdom|Ryûkyû Kingdom]] in [[1737]] to [[1750]].<ref>Gallery labels, ''Ryukyu/Okinawa no chizu ten'', Okinawa Prefectural Museum, Feb 2017.</ref>
By [[1775]], Prussian blue, known in Chinese as ''yángqīng'' 洋青 or ''yángdiàn'' 洋靛, was among the goods being imported into the [[Qing Empire]] by English merchants. By [[1777]], [[Ryukyuan tributary missions to China|Ryukyuan tributary missions]] returning from China were bringing the pigment into Ryûkyû.
Prussian blue was not widely used in mainland Japan until the 1830s, however, with a series of fan prints by [[Keisai Eisen]] from [[1829]] being perhaps the first to be printed entirely in Prussian blue (as ''[[ai-e]]'', or "blue pictures") without any other colors.<ref>"[http://shunga.honolulumuseum.org/2013/index.php?page=125&language=&maxImageHeight=470&headerTop=0&headerHeight=109&footerTop=579&bw=1366&sh=0&refreshed=refreshed#.VH1YvsmTLqM Tongue in Cheek: Erotic Art in 19th-Century Japan]," Honolulu Museum of Art, exhibition website, accessed 1 Dec 2014.</ref> Many of the most famous ''ukiyo-e'' images employing Prussian blue - such as Hokusai's "Great Wave," are from the 1830s.
Prussian blue was not widely used in mainland Japan until the 1830s, however, with a series of fan prints by [[Keisai Eisen]] from [[1829]] being perhaps the first to be printed entirely in Prussian blue (as ''[[ai-e]]'', or "blue pictures") without any other colors.<ref>"[http://shunga.honolulumuseum.org/2013/index.php?page=125&language=&maxImageHeight=470&headerTop=0&headerHeight=109&footerTop=579&bw=1366&sh=0&refreshed=refreshed#.VH1YvsmTLqM Tongue in Cheek: Erotic Art in 19th-Century Japan]," Honolulu Museum of Art, exhibition website, accessed 1 Dec 2014.</ref> Many of the most famous ''ukiyo-e'' images employing Prussian blue - such as Hokusai's "Great Wave," are from the 1830s.
