Senjūshō 撰集抄

This material is held atBritish Library Asia, Pacific and Africa Collections

  • Reference
    • GB 59 Or.74.cc.16
  • Dates of Creation
    • [1610-1615]
  • Language of Material
    • Japanese
  • Physical Description
    • 3 volumes Condition: Good. Some folios stained, but free from worm damage throughout. Impression: Lightly inked, with distinct signs of type wear. Seals of ownership: Oblong red seal, Enkai Nichigyō 圓海日曉, on first page of each satsu.

Scope and Content

Author/compiler: Unknown. Formerly attributed to the poet-priest Saigyō 西行, 1118-90. Imprint: N.p., n.d. [Saga 嵯峨, latter Keichō period, c. 1610-15.]. Description: 9 kan, 3 satsu, 3 kan to each. Each satsu begins with a mokuroku 目録 listing the contents of the 3 kan within. Folios unnumbered. 27.3 x 20 cm. Fukurotoji. Movable type. Printing frame 22.3 x 16.9 cm. No borders. No printed hanshin. Hiragana-majiri text, with dakuten and kutōten added in red ink. 9 lines to page, 18 characters to line. Renewed covers (recent), creamy white, embossed to give a woven effect, overprinted with a large floral design in mica. No title slips. No gedai. Naidai: Senjūshō maki dai 1 (etc.) 撰集抄巻第一 (等) 西行記 (the latter in maki 1 only). In a modern chitsu case of yellow silk brocade. Edition: Saga-bon. The earliest printed edition of this work, undated but undoubtedly printed in the last quarter of the Keichō period, utilising the type cut for the Saga-bon Ise monogatari and printed next after that work. The present copy, lacking its original covers, is on plain paper treated with gofun. A number of other movable type editions followed the Saga-bon in Genna and Kan'ei periods, all undated and all based on the Saga-bon edition. Contents: A collection of tales, anecdotes and discursive notes on a variety of topics, literary, biographical and religious, strongly tinged with Buddhist thought. Classed as a work of setsuwa bungaku, with a tendency towards zuihitsu.

Access Information

Not Public Record(s)

Unrestricted

Acquisition Information

Presented by Mr. S. Sorimachi, 26 Sept. 1972.

Other Finding Aids

Kenneth Gardner, Descriptive Catalogue of Japanese books in the British Library printed before 1700 (London and Tenri, 1993).C. Japanese works 和書 5. Literature - fiction 国文-小説 b. Setsuwa bungaku 説話文学.

Bibliography

Kokatsujiban no kenkyū 古活字版の研究, pp. 445-6, 519-20, pl. 282; Nihon koten bungaku daijiten 日本古典文学大辞典, vol. 3, p. 644; Seikidō zenpon shomoku 成簣堂善本書目, p. 184.