Syllable E from the series Seven Variations of the Kana Syllabary (Seisho nanatsu iroha)

With the series of syllables from the Japanese syllabary iroha in seven calligraphic variants, Kunisada returned to the popular series of stations on the Tōkaidō Road and scenes with one hundred poets. The series Seven Variations of Syllabary Characters (Seisho nanatsu iroha) has a similar typographic design with a decorative heading and a loosely-following illustration composed in a square with a direct link to kabuki theatre. The National Gallery Prague houses 32 sheets from the original series of 47 syllables (some in duplicate) selected from two albums. After the great success of this cycle, Kunisada published a continuation of this series of theatre scenes, which were sorted by syllabary characters or by the characters of the iroha poem (Nanatsu iroha shūi). The print shows a scene from the drama Edozakura Sukeroku and a portrait of Kawarasaki Gonjūrō as Sukeroku holding an umbrella. Ichikawa Danzō VI is seated in the background as the angry old man Hige no Ikyū. (See Helena Honcoopová, Kunisada, Praha 2005, p. 210)