Print Frere Soga Courtesan Mount Fuji

This print was made by Chikanobu Toyohora in 1884, it is taken from a series called "Azuma Nishiki chuya Kurake" which translates as comparison of day and night and was published by Takegawa Seikichi.
The central theme is the revenge of the Soga brothers whose fight we see at the top of the print and at the bottom the tears of Tora de Oiso at the death of his Juro Sukenari (one of the brothers) with Mount Fuji in the background, the action taking place around Mount Fuji.
The print is in perfect condition with embossing on the kimono.

The story of the revenge of the Soga brothers is as follows: the two Soga brothers, Juro Sukenari and Goro Tokimune were the sons of Kawazu Sukeyasu, murdered by Kudo Suketsune in the mountains of Hakoné. When their father died, the two brothers were only 5 and 3 years old; but as they grew up, their desire to avenge their father only grew stronger. According to a popular staged version, Sukeyasu's widow married a certain Soga Sukenobu who adopted Juro Sukenari and gave him his name; the youngest boy was sent to a temple to become a monk. But the murderer Suketsune, worried about knowing his victim's two sons were alive, rightly feared their revenge. He took advantage of his good relations with the shogun Yoritomo and begged the latter to get rid of the Soga brothers, showing him that these two boys would surely try to assassinate the Shogun to avenge the murder of their grandfather in Sukechika. Yoritomo listened to Suketsune's advice and sent one of his captains to Soga with a mission to bring back the two brothers and have them beheaded. But, at the urging of various influential figures, notably Hatakeyama Shigetada, the Shogun agreed to spare the lives of the children and sent them back to their mother. In 1190, Tokimune, then aged 16, managed to escape from the monastery; he went to join his brother Juro and they both swore not to abandon their plan for revenge. One day, Sukenari learned that Suketsune was in Yoritomo's camp, at the foot of Mount Fuji, and was preparing for a great hunt. He jumped on a horse that was grazing in a field and, using a large radish as a whip, he rode to Oiso where his brother was and brought him back to Soga's house to prepare for their expedition. But their plans were foiled that that day by their own mother who feared some betrayal on the part of their brother-in-law, a supporter of Suketsune, and who happened to be in the house. To deceive this man's distrust, the mother supposedly prepared for the marriage of her two boys with the two daughters Tora of Oiso, and Shosho of KEihaizaka, and thus avoided a possible betrayal. The same night the two brothers met in a garden and, ignoring the storm that was raging throughout the region, they set out for the camp of Yoritomo where they saw everyone in feverish preparations for the hunt for the the following day. There they met a servant of Htakeyama Shigetada who showed them a tent in which they found Suketsune sleeping. Tokimune was already raising his saber to decapitate him, when his brother stopped him, telling him that killing a sleeping enemy was as much as cutting up a corpse; then they shouted: “The Soga brothers are here to avenge the murder of their father!” Suketsune, stunned, only had time to recognize them, then fell struck to death. But the cries of the Soga raised the alarm in the camp; people rushed from all sides; the eldest brother was instantly massacred by Nitan no Shiro. As for Tokimune, he tried to free himself by fighting bravely against Suketsune's servants; However, he was seized from behind by a wrestler named Gosho no Goromaru, disguised as a woman, and taken before Yoritomo. The latter wanted to spare the life of Goro Tokimune, given his young age and his great courage, but he could not refuse justice to Suketsune's son who arrived and Goro was put to death...

Chikanobu Toyohora 豊原周延 (1838-1912), his stage name is also 楊洲周延: Yōshū Chikanobu. He is from the samurai caste and fought alongside the loyalists under the shogun. After the reissue of the shogun, he decided to become an artist in his youth he learned the school of Kano. Chikanobu is recognized as a master of bijinga, images of beautiful women, and for his illustrations of changes in women's fashion, both in traditional clothing than in Western clothing. Her works illustrate changes in hairstyle and makeup over time. He also painted warrior prints