The Great Battle of Ansong Ford: The Valor of Captain Matsuzaki
A nishiki-e woodblock print titled 'The Great Battle of Ansong Ford: The Valor of Captain Matsuzaki' shows a Japanese officer leading a bayonet charge against fleeing Chinese soldiers during the First Sino-Japanese War. Mass-produced war prints like this one turned individual battlefield episodes into heroic set pieces for a home audience that had no other way to see the front.
- Date
- 1894
- Period
- Pre-1914
- Made by
- Empire of Japan (First Sino-Japanese War home-front print); artist Mizuno Toshikata
- Region
- East Asia
- Country
- Empire of Japan
- Medium
- Issuer type
- State
- Regime
- Meiji Japan
- Leader
- Ito Hirobumi
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Commemorate
- Themes
- War and the military, Home front
- Event
- First Sino Japanese War
- Techniques
- Glittering generalities
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Wikimedia Commons, retrieved September 28, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (per Wikimedia Commons)
1AE-wzzCmlXXDQ at Google Cultural Institute maximum zoom level
Text on the object
安城渡大激戦 松崎大尉勇猛 [illegible — small printed publisher's colophon (date and printer/publisher line), bottom left margin] [artist seal, bottom left margin]
The Great Battle of Ansong Ford The Valor of Captain Matsuzaki [illegible — small printed publisher's colophon] [artist seal]
The title cartouche (top right) is clearly legible and matches the record title. A vertical colophon line in the bottom-left margin (beginning with what appears to be a Meiji-era date) and the artist's red seal beside it are too small/low-contrast in this scan to transcribe confidently; not guessed at.
