Page:A Grammar of Japanese Ornament and Design (1880).djvu/19



HE great difficulties attending any attempt to explore, still less to explain, the art thoughts and methods of a people who for centuries kept themselves aloof from all foreign intercourse, and their country jealously closed against strangers, can be readily appreciated by those who have studied the artistic industries of Japan. At various periods within the last three centuries some slight insight into the subject has been obtained, but the natural reticence of the Japanese, added to their dislike for foreigners generally, has made it impossible that anything like a comprehensive knowledge should be gained. The writers to whom we are indebted for our earliest knowledge of Japan give us little information with regard to its art, and it is only since the opening of the country within the last twenty years, that a few foreigners have sufficiently mastered the difficulties of the language to enable them to commence a study of the art methods and principles. Although in two or three recent works many valuable investigations have been entered upon, there is still much to be learned before the theory and practice of Japanese art can be satisfactorily explained.

The magnificent collection brought to England for the Exhibition of 1862, by Sir Rutherford Alcock, K.C.B., then H.B.M. Minister to Japan, first gave the outside world an insight into the decorative arts of this interesting country; and aroused that enthusiasm for its productions which has exercised so great an influence on European decorative art, and awakened the desire in art circles to explore the fresh field of inquiry thus thrown open. In order to understand the conditions which have tended to form the strictly national character of Japanese art, it is desirable to pass in review some of the leading features of the history and institutions of the country, and the author hopes that the following pages, written after careful study of the leading authorities, and supplemented by the assistance of friends now in England, whose long residence in Japan renders their information of great value, will interest, and afford some aid in the study of the subject.

Although intercourse has existed between Corea, China, and Japan for the last thirteen centuries, it was not until the sixteenth that Europeans set their foot in the country, when some Portuguese adventurers sought shelter upon an unknown coast, which proved to be Japan. The earliest European writers from whom we obtain any valuable knowledge of the country are, first, Kaempfer, then Thunberg, and lastly Siebold, all of whom were medical