Izumigawa 泉川 Family History in Okinawa

My grandparents were from the Ryukyu Kingdom or what is known today as Okinawa Prefecture.

2009 Exhibition flyer Okinawa Prefectural Museum / Art Gallery featuring Kantoku Izumigawa’s painting from the 1800s. 400 years since Satsuma invasion and 130 years from Ryukyu disposition. As the kingdom was incorporated into the Japanese national system, painters from the Ryukyu dynasty era gradually ceased, Okinawa’s paintings are rarely seen. By the Ryukyu kingdom dismantling, an attempt to bury the modern painting tradition has broken off, as the successor of the traditional painting from the King of the Ryukyu dynasty inherited the Meiji period Painters. Okinawan painters are different from Western painters of the modern era.

Ryukyu History

The 1200s were known as the Castle or Gusuku period. My grandfather’s hometown was called Nakagusuku (Castle town) in central Okinawa which has a famous castle ruin on the coast.

During the 1300s, political organization within the Ryukyu islands consisted of local rulers based at castles near harbors. The islands and the main island of Okinawa was not a unified political entity in the late 1300s.

According to Gregory Smits, Maritime Ryukyu, in the 1400s, the Ryukyuans who traveled abroad were seen as barbarians. In 1466, Ryukyuan envoys in Japan went outside the main gate of Kyoto and began shooting off Chinese firearms, terrifying local residents. Disorderly Rykyuans also strained the patience of Ming officials. The Ming court was well aware that the Ryukyu islands were full of pirates.

Shuri Castle which was burned to the ground in 2020.

Ming Dynasty Tribute Trade

Trade with Ming China was advantageous to foreign states. Foreign courts sent envoys and products as tribute to the Chinese emperor and he responded with envoys and…