菌類図譜
大正2(1913)年
田中長嶺
「菌類」とはキノコのことで、日本各地、朝鮮で採取された５４０種ものキノコを描く図鑑です。この作品の作者である田中長嶺は、明治から大正にかけて活躍したキノコの研究家、農事改良家です。新潟県の農家出身で、貧しい山村の収入源を増やすために、キノコの栽培に取り組み、日本で初めてシイタケの、菌糸の人工接種による栽培法を開発しました。また、その栽培法を指導するために日本各地を回り、生涯、自分の家や妻子を持たず、寒村の産業の振興に一生をささげました。現在、お店で売られているキノコは、ほとんどが人工栽培で作られたものですが、その大もとになっているのは、この長嶺が開発した技術です。
晩年の長嶺は、シイタケの指導を引退し、親しかった三河の文化人たちのもとに滞在し、そのお礼として作品を贈りました。西尾では、中町の聖運寺や貝吹の長圓寺、名倉家、上永良の加藤家などに滞在し、いくつもの作品を残しています。この菌類図譜は、上矢田の大地主、杉浦其粦(きりん)のために大正２年に描いたものです、
長嶺は、若い頃に画家になるための修行をし、また一時、東京帝国大学で西洋から入ってきたばかりの高等菌学の勉強もしていたため、確かな観察眼と描写力を合わせ持っていました。キノコの特徴を良くとらえ、かつ表現することができた見事な図鑑となっています。
A Collection of Fungi
2nd year of Taishō (1913)
Author: Tanaka Nagane
This text is titled “A Collection of Fungi.”
“Fungi” are commonly known as “mushrooms.” This text illustrates the 540 varieties of mushrooms found in Japan and on the Korean peninsula. The author, Tanaka Nagane, was a mushroom researcher and advocate of agricultural reform from the Meiji through Taishō periods (late 1860’s through the 1920’s).
Coming from a farming family in Niigata prefecture, he hoped to improve the income of poor farmers in mountain villages. In order to improve mushroom cultivation he pioneered cultivation of shitake mushrooms via artificial inoculation. In order to promote this cultivation method, he traveled throughout Japan his whole life. Neither owning his own home, nor marrying or having children, he dedicated his life to promoting the agricultural industry of impoverished Japanese villages. Today, most of the mushrooms you buy in the supermarket are the product of artificial inoculation and each one of the techniques used to create these mushrooms is a descendant of Nagane’s pioneering methods.
During Nagane’s final years, he retired from instructing about shitake mushrooms and lived with various friends among the literati of the Mikawa area and in thanks for their hospitality gave them many texts. In Nishio city, he lived in the Shōun-ji Temple in Nakamachi, in the Chōen-ji Temple and the Nagura family house in Kaifuku, and in the Katō family house in Kaminagara, etc. and left several works in each location. A Collection of Fungi was written in 1913 for Sugiura Kirin, a large landowner in Kamiyata.
In his younger years, Nagane trained as an artist and for a period of time studied newly imported cutting-edge western-style fungal studies at Tokyo Imperial University. Combined with his keen observational and drawing skills, he was able to adroitly depict the minute characteristics of mushrooms, making A Collection of Fungi a particularly impressive horticultural guide.
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