His Mysteriousness

北亜墨利加洪和政治洲上官真像之写, translated as “A true likeness of the commanding officer from the Republic of North America,” is a portrait of Matthew Perry, Commodore of the United States Navy. Perry is largely credited for opening the doors of Japan in 1854 with his delivery of a letter from President Fillmore intended for the Emperor of Japan.

The creator of this image is unknown, but we know its title because it is written in the top right of the image. It is interesting to note that the title is completely written in kanji. In modern Japanese, many of the words represented in kanji would be written using hiragana and katakana, namely the word “America” (here written as 亜米利加). Katakana words are import words – that is, words taken from other languages and phonetically spelled using the Japanese alphabet. In a time of such isolation and xenophobia, it is quite possible that the author didn’t want to use katakana because it could seem like a foreign-imported word.

The image is distributed in 1854 as a monochrome printed broadsheet (瓦版). Without modern-day broadcasting mediums such as the Internet and television, a monochrome broadsheet print was the least expensive and quickest means of widely spreading an image. Since 1854 was a time of Japanese xenophobia, this physically inaccurate portrait was most likely used as anti-Western propaganda. This portrait was most likely created without the artist even seeing Perry, since Perry went out of his way to make himself as inaccessible as possible (according to Dower).

The portrait is very physically inaccurate. Perry is depicted as demonic, loosely modeled after the Japanese goblin (天狗). He is holding a sword, though it is not threatening, since the sword is sheathed. He is wearing a hat with a strange symbol. The hat looks almost Chinese, and the symbol is not a recognizable American one. Perry’s facial features are extremely exaggerated, with massive earlobes, a long nose and chin, and large eyes and mouth. He is clearly not Japanese, and perhaps the exaggerated facial features are meant to ostracize him as a foreigner.

The portrait does not depict Perry’s whole reason for being in Japan: the delivery of the President’s letter. Although he is shown to be in Navy uniform, there is no depiction of (or even hint thereof) the letter to the Emperor. Which begs the question, what was the purpose of the image? If it wasn’t to educate the Japanese about why there was an American army landed in Japan, then what was it meant to depict?

Though it isn’t possible to determine the actual purpose of the image due to lack of information, we can make some guesses at the artist’s intention. Since Japan was so isolated during this time period, it is likely that the Japanese feared a foreign presence. This image was likely meant not to spread fear, but to reduce fear by spreading information, regardless of how inaccurate the information may be. With a face to match with Perry’s name, the Japanese can rest more easily since they have some information about a presence they rightly named “His High and Mighty Mysteriousness.”