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Hannah Leonard

International Relations in the Early Modern East Asia: The Role of Intermediaries

1 June 2023

Midterm Report/Presentation Proposal

Originally, I had first wanted to do my report on Yasuke ((弥助), the African samurai
who served the Daimyo Oda Nobunaga. However, while trying to research him I discovered
several black and white photos that claimed to be of the semi-mythological warrior. This
immediately threw me off guard since he would have most certainly died centuries before the
invention of the camera. Here are a few examples:

FIG 1 (Simpson 2021) FIG 2 (Kintaro Publishing 2019) FIG 3 (Samurai History 2022)

In the case of each of the above examples, these photos were all presented as being
actual photos of him. So it goes without saying that the sources for these photos were typically
quite bad, and mostly only offer surface level descriptions of what little historical evidence we
have of the real Yasuke. That being said, after discovering these widely circulated photos, I
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became curious as to who was actually being depicted in them. This ended up being a pretty
difficult task, as the algorithms of the English-speaking have heavily linked these images to
Yasuke already. Reverse-image searches were mostly unfruitful, and so far I have only managed
to find a better source for the image in FIG 3 (Alamy) that cites the photo as being of an
unnamed actor.

Overall, I have been left with a sort of sense of awe with the lack of care on the internet
for this subject. I found dozens of articles that cited these images uncritically, and it has been
extremely hard to find more credible sources for the images as they are. While they may not have
been Yasuke, I still believe there is a lot of value in knowing more about the identity of the
people actually depicted in these photos. Were they examples of other African or dark-skinned
servants living in Japan? Are they simply actors posing as Yasuke for some sort of play? Perhaps
they are fabricated/edited photos made by some online magazine for clicks… It’s hard to tell!

In an effort to know more, I began researching the early history of photography in Japan,
with the hopes that it might tell me more about where these photos may have come from. While I
still have yet to know the origins of even half of the alleged “Yasuke photos” I found online, I
still feel like this effort has helped me find what I would like to present on for my course project.
I would like to discuss early photographers in Japan, such as Ichiki Shirō, Ueno Hikoma,
Shimooka Renjo, Felice Beato, and Baron Raimund von Stillfried . I believe that their role as
some of the earliest figures to use photography as a means to record and share what life was like
in Japan made them political and cultural intermediaries.

Their work ultimately had a great influence on the geopolitics of Japan as it reopened
during the 19th century, serving as the basis for many foreign countries to understand more about
its culture and presence on the international stage. This is true even today, as the photographical
material from their time period continues to influence how we understand Japanese history (even
if it is subject to being cited improperly on occasion).
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Works Cited

Alamy. “Late 19th Century Photograph - Two Samurai Warriors (Probably Actors) in Full

Japanese Armour Japan, c.1880'S.” Alamy Images,

www.alamy.com/late-19th-century-photograph-two-samurai-warriors-probably-actors-in-

full-japanese-armour-japan-c1880s-image402056373.html.

“Biopic of the First Foreign Samurai to Be Produced.” Pen Magazine International, 7 Aug.

2020, pen-online.com/culture/biopic-of-the-first-foreign-samurai-to-be-produced.

Kintaro Publishing. “弥助：日本におけるアフリカのサムライ.” Kintaro Publishing, Nov. 2019,

kintaro-publishing.com/ja-jp/blogs/news/yasuke-the-african-samurai-in-japan.

Samurai History. “The First Black Samurai - Samurai History.” Samurai History, 11 Jan. 2022,

www.samuraihistory.com/the-first-black-samurai.

Simpson, Tellie. “Yasuke: The African Samurai.” A Girl in a Museum World, 5 Apr. 2021,

agirlinamuseumworld.com/blogs/museummonday-s/yasuke-the-african-samurai-warrior.