Posted by Dan in Syracuse on March 21, 1998 at 00:17:53:
In Reply to: Re: Prohibition Period posted by Theo de Kreijger on March 17, 1998 at 17:25:30:
If the print has two censor seals, it's 1847-52. Absurdly enough, they doubled the censors even though the real power of censorship had been lost. Another theory says that the censors doubled-up to protect themselves--in case anyone did notice the law was not being upheld, two was better than one. I'm particularly interested in prints from the censorship period with "shita-uri" seals on them. This seal was a tacit admission that the print was out of bounds, and prints with such a seal could not be openly displayed. Though of course they were, because the seal also gave the prints that excitement of stetching the bounds and being on the edge.