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I enjoyed your story greatly. Enough that I shall now chain you to the wall and tickle your nose with this feather until you tell me another.
GP - Haven't had a chance to read the story until now - very enjoyable. Japan's answer to the Brother's Grimm? Never even considered that there might be someone like that.
Looking forward to the others you mentioned you were going to post.
My Finished Maps | My Challenge Maps | Still poking around occasionally...
Unless otherwise stated by me in the post, all work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.
I enjoyed your story greatly. Enough that I shall now chain you to the wall and tickle your nose with this feather until you tell me another.
Very pretty. Love the style.
Objects and Labels
Next up... I started to place provincial borders, after removing the first set of mountains, then the provincial names. I placed castles at the most important locations - Heian-kyo, Fukuwara-kyo, and Akishima. I place temples in Hiroshima and Nara.
Of the kamon or family crests - the major ones of course are Clan Taira (swallow tail butterfly icon, with colors black on red), Clan Minamoto (Woodland Sorrel, with colors black on white) and the Clan Fujiwara who controlled the emperor with a Swamp Sorrel. I also placed a few more kamon for families in differing provincial areas, only creating the Shimizu clan in Izumo, and the Matsu clan in Hoki.
As I discover which clans were in which province, I will start to populate with other Kamon for those houses.
Whereever you see a pair of war banners, there was a battle at the location of the Gempei War. One battle site, I'm not sure of, and will move to correct location when I find it. The battle banners at Bingo is just a guess right now.
I am thinking of placing a large square grid, though I'm not sure what scale and whether I should do miles or not. Still deciding. I placed much smaller version of the previos mountains back in, with more space between. I still think I need 20% more mountains.
Remember, Japan is a chain of volcanic mountains. 80% of the land surface is mountainous. Sure some villages, and towns now exist, but most of millions of Japanese dwell in the remaining 20% arable lands. Japan is noticeably mountainous - so the map needs to show this better.
I plan to place all the major characters involved in the battle across the top of the map, even beyond the current borders - retired Emperor Go-Shirakawa, Yoritomo Minamoto, Yoshi-tsune Minamoto, Kiyomori Taira, and Prince Antoku.
WIP so far... getting there, about 3/4 done I'd say.
GP
### Latest WIP ###
Last edited by Gamerprinter; 02-06-2009 at 09:39 PM.
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The boy who drew cats
I chose to tell this next story, as its one of the two I am aware of that has something to do with art, not maps unfortunately, but should still be interesting.
The Boy who Drew Cats
by Koizumi Yagumo, as retold by GP...
There once was a farmer who lived in the highlands south of Osaka, who had three sons. The eldest son was hired by the local daimyo to serve as an ashigaru or foot soldier under the command of his samurai. The second son was to inherit the family farm. To the third son, no inheritance would come, as the farmer was quite poor.
The worst problem, the boy, name Hiroshi, spent much of his days drawing cats. There was some hope that if the boy learned portraiture, who could serve the local lord as a fine artist. Unfortunately, the boy only desired to draw cats.
Finally, with no other opportunities available, the farmer contacted the priests of Nara, and asked if his youngest son could join the priesthood and have some future. They agreed.
Much to the dismay of the high priest, Hiroshi spent the time he should have been studying, drawing dozens of cat images with the tsukue brush, everyday. Though he finally "graduated" from the seminary. Unsure how best the use the useless boy. The priests sent Hiroshi to Osaka to restore an old Buddhist temple that had been abandoned twenty years ago.
Hiroshi arrived at the temple site, in old Osaka late on a rainy night. He tried to busy himself cleaning the temple as many years of neglect made it in poor condition. The roof leaked in many places and the rain poured in. After some cleaning, Hiroshi was bored and began to draw cats on the sliding Shogi screens around the temple.
It got very late and the rains would not stop. Hiroshi found a cabinet off the main temple room that looked water tight enough to keep him dry. He crawled within and tried to get comfortable for a nights rest.
Only after an hour, as he was beginning to sleep, a loud noise came from the front of the temple and several voices began to argue in a hissing way. By the smell and coarse noises, peeking out the crack in the door of cabinet, Hiroshi discovered that a gang of Hengeyokai - goblin rats the size of men used the abandoned temple as their secret nest. They would waylay travelers on the street late at night, kill them, eat them and take their valuables for their own.
Hiroshi began to pray silently, hoping he wouldn't be discovered.
Suddenly, Hiroshi heard a hiss and yowl, as if from an angry cat. The single cat turned into a dozen and the screeching of goblin rats mixed in the fray. Hiroshi shook with fear, but remained hidden in his cabinet. The ensuing fight continued for some time, but all was quiet by morning.
When Hiroshi crawled from the cabinet in the morning light. He saw the grisly sight of a dozen goblin rats dead throughout the temple, their throats ripped open. Throughout the temple on the shoji screens were the cats he drew the night before.
All the drawn cats had blood dripping from their mouths.
The End...
GP
Last edited by Gamerprinter; 02-06-2009 at 09:43 PM.
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95% done
OK, I'd say I'm 95% done with the map. A few more kamon crests, a scale label saying "each square is 50 miles", a compass rose, and a "by line". Then the basic map will be done. I want to place ukiyo-e illustrations of the major players above the map, a legend below it, and a reed mat as the frame. Almost complete!
For the historical sticklers, the kamon placement except for very few is completely random, I have no real idea which families control which province. I just wanted it to look authentic and complete.
GP
PS: more stories tomorrow, now I'm off to bed!
### Latest WIP ###
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Definitely, your map is already my favorite.
I'd have to say that is one of the prettiest maps I have ever seen on this site. If this does not get one of those "map-of-the-month" awards, I will write a stern letter to the admin.
This is a stunning piece of work GP - and may be one of my absolute favorites of yours.
One thing I noticed - on the red 'battle banners' the symbol is very blurred (or at least appears to be), not sure if you can/want to do anything about it, but I thought I'd point it out anyway.
My Finished Maps | My Challenge Maps | Still poking around occasionally...
Unless otherwise stated by me in the post, all work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.
Add me in as well, very nice. I like this new font better too.
If the radiance of a thousand suns was to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the Mighty One...I am become Death, the Shatterer of worlds.
-J. Robert Oppenheimer (father of the atom bomb) alluding to The Bhagavad Gita (Chapter 11, Verse 32)
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