Japanese Sumo Wrestling Cards and Menko
Wednesday, July 25, 2018
1933 Rikishi 4-5 Set: R331 Sumo Wrestling Menko
1932 and 1933 were very strange years in Japanese sumo. The Shunjuen Incident had just occurred where 32 rikishi gathered at the Shunjuen Chinese restaurant in Tokyo demanding reforms from the Nihon Sumo Kyokai ultimately resulting in the postponement of the January 1932 tournament and the rikishi leaving the NSK. The rikishi formed several new sumo groups in called the Great Japan Emerging Rikishi Group and the Progressive Rikishi Group. (source: Sumo Fan Magazine). Over the next 4 years these groups struggled and the last of the "rogue" wrestlers disbanded in 1937. In 1933, during the height of this turmoil, the R331: 1933 Rikishi 4-5 menko set was produced. A lot of reorganization was happening during 1933 with the rikishi that were left and so this set has a variety of rank mismatches which indicated it was produced over the course of many months. Surprisingly, this set is one of the easier 1930s R-series sets to come across which might indicate sumo was entering a popular period.
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Hard to believe that these things are 85 years old. They're gorgeous. Especially love the wave and the mountain on it. I realize that all trading cards are a form of art in their own way... but these take art to the next level.
ReplyDeleteThe artwork on these 1930s cards is pretty legit. And they survived the war and fire bombings which makes it even crazier.
DeleteThat is a fascinating set and interesting about the rival sumo association that briefly survived (I have a fascination with those challengers to the established Leagues, like the Federal League in American baseball).
ReplyDeleteIt was all sorts of crazy back in the first half of the 20th Century with the wars, earthquake, walkouts.....kind of reminds me of the XFL in the 1980s.
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