(b 1834; d 1905). Japanese calligrapher and poet. From childhood he was absorbed and fascinated with calligraphy. He studied under Nakazawa Setsujo (1810–66), mastered the style developed by MAKI RYOKO of the late Edo period (1600–1868) and absorbed the work of ZHAO MENGFU, a Chinese calligrapher of the Southern Song period (1127–1279), who had a substantial influence on early Meiji period (1868–1912) Japanese calligraphy. At the age of 16, however, following family tradition, Ichiroku had gone to Tokyo to study medicine and later duly became a doctor in the Mizoguchi domain (now in Shiga Prefect.). In 1868 Ichiroku joined the fledgling Meiji government, rising in his 20-year career to high office and ultimately an imperial appointment to the House of Peers for his dedicated service. In 1881 he met YANG SHOUJING, adviser to the Chinese ambassador to Japan and also a geographer, calligrapher and scholar who had brought to Japan thousands of rubbings of funerary inscriptions from China, particularly from the Six Dynasties period (AD 265–581). Ichiroku and his calligrapher colleagues KUSAKABE MEIKAKU and Matsuda Sekka (1814–81) were excited by the rediscovery of this material and became major advocates of early Chinese-style calligraphy in Japan. Unlike Meikaku and Sekka, who developed large groups of calligraphy disciples, Ichiroku spent his later years travelling widely in the country creating calligraphies on screens, for scrolls, for plaques and for stone monuments. Admired not only for his calligraphy but also for his poetry and painting, he has been regarded as one of the principal figures of artistic life during the Meiji period.

• Iwaya Ichiroku
  • Japan, §VII, 2(vi)(f): Literati calligraphy: Masters of the late Edo and Meiji periods