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Attribution Marking: | Hodo signature; Takemura seal |
Title-caption (right margin): | 田鴫 , ta-shigi, Common Snipe |
Publication Date (left margin): | 昭和十五年七月作 (July 1940) |
Takemura Copyright (lower left margin): 版権所有 竹村秀雄, han ken sho yu Takemura Hideo, ‘printing rights held by Takemura Hideo’. |
Design History:
Common Snipe (Paddyfield Snipe), Gallinago gallinago, 田鴫, 田鷸, たしぎ, タシギ, ta-shigi, lit. 'field shorebird'. Historically, 鴫 (also written 鷸, しぎ, シギ), shigi, can be translated as 'snipe', but it is more often today rendered as 'sandpiper'. A better English equivalent is 'shorebird' since the meaning actually includes any bird in the families Scolopacidae or Rostratulidae.
Common Reed , Phragmites australis, 蘆, 芦, 葦, 葭, あし, アシ, ashi, 'reed' is a native waterplant found in Japan and much of temperate South and East Asia. The Japanese name is also a general one for 'reed' and refers to any similar species. Here the vegetation is rendered very abstractly, and it is possible that an additional kind of grass is also represented.