Yoshiwara Licensed Quarters at Dawn

A gray main street runs straight toward the Great Gate at the back. Along the road walk a man with a cloth wrapped around his face and a customer with attendants, and at right a cherry tree enclosed by a bamboo fence bears full blossoms. Large roofs of brothels line both sides, and lanterns are lit at the end of the street.

The sky begins to brighten, indigo at the top and pale blue below, and the ground is gradated from gray to green. By keeping the whole in subdued colors and letting only the white of the cherry blossoms faintly float up, the print conveys the chilly air before dawn.

Shin-Yoshiwara was the shogunate-licensed pleasure quarter north of Asakusa, and in spring cherries were planted along its main street, Nakanocho, making it a famous place for the flowering season only. Yoshiwara also burned in the great Ansei earthquake, and it is said that business continued for a time in temporary quarters. Customers who had spent the night left the Great Gate at dawn and went home along the Nihon Embankment.

This print belongs to the Spring section. Painting the splendid quarter in the stillness of dawn shows well the series' emphasis on mood. The Winter section also includes Nihon Embankment, Yoshiwara, depicting the road to Yoshiwara.