著者

安蔵 裕子

出版者

昭和女子大学近代文化研究所

雑誌

学苑 = Gakuen (ISSN:13480103)

巻号頁・発行日

no.923, pp.26-35, 2017-09-01

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Abstract In 2014, the Imperial Guard Headquarters of Japan gave seven helmets worn by the guards in the Imperial Police during the Meiji and Taisho periods to the Koyo Museum at Showa Women’s University. This paper introduces one of them, comments on its shape, materials, and characteristics, gives the history of the Imperial Police from their inception in 1886, and discusses that organization’s dress code. The helmet was found in 2012 in the warehouse of the Kyoto Imperial Palace along with 52 similar helmets. It was kept in a wooden box on which a paper with the guard’s name, Naoharu Tamai, was affixed. Tamai’s name appears in the 1915 record of the Imperial Police. The shape of the helmet is apparently based on the spiked pickelhaube worn by Prussian sodiers, fire-fighters and police. The shell seems to be made of papers pasted onto a wooden mold. The outer surface is japanned with black lacquer(黒漆). This type of helmet is called a peach-shaped helmet(桃子様兜). There is a hole drilled in the top and a round metal ornament similar to hachimanza(八幡座)is at the top of the helmet. There is a large metal ornament of a chrysanthemum with leaves at the front. Leather is used for the inner sweat band. There is also a metal chinstrap combined with several wavy-shaped thin pieces of metal decorating it. Thus, the helmet is an example of a Japanese effort to adopt western clothing styles during the Meiji Period, but one which continued to use traditional Japanese ornamentation and materials.