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Secondary sourcePaintingc. 1827

Murasaki Shikibu, Four Companions of the Writing Studio

Yashima Gakutei · c. 1827

A woodblock print portraying Murasaki Shikibu, made centuries after her life as part of a series of famous writers.

A later imagined portrait of Murasaki Shikibu, showing how she was remembered as a model writer centuries after her death.

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Woodblock print of a seated woman in a patterned robe with long black hair, holding an open book on her lap. A stack of books sits on a low lacquered table with an inkstone, beside a round silver moon in a pale sky. Vertical Japanese text and a red seal appear.
Yashima Gakutei, Murasaki Shikibu, from Four Companions of the Writing Studio of the Ichiyo Circle, c. 1827. Sackler Museum, Harvard University.

About this source

What it is

This is a Japanese woodblock print by Yashima Gakutei, made around 1827, part of a series called Four Companions of the Writing Studio of the Ichiyo Circle. It is held today in the Sackler Museum at Harvard University.

Why it matters

Murasaki Shikibu lived centuries before this print was made, so it does not record her real appearance. Instead it shows how later Japanese artists imagined and honored her as one of their country's greatest writers, surrounding her with books, an inkstone, and the moon.

Look closer

  • What objects surround her, and what do they suggest about how she is remembered?
  • Why might an artist centuries later choose to depict a famous writer this way?
  • What does this print tell us about her legacy rather than her real life?

This painting is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Murasaki Shikibu on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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