Anglo-Japanese Numismatic Society

Dentuck

Does anyone have any information on the Anglo-Japanese Numismatic Society --- in particular, regarding this portrait medal of Emperor Hirohito?

Thanks!

-- Dentuck

satootoko

Never heard of the group, and a Google search brings up zero hits.

Japan has never put a real person's portrait on any of its coins.

The legend demonstrates a serious lack of understanding of Japanese custom. "In Memoriam" obviously means the piece was struck after his death on January 7, 1989; but as of January 8, 1989, he would only be referred to as "the Showa Emperor", and not by his given name.

Dentuck

Very interesting, Satootoko! Thank you for that information.

I found the eBay description I wrote up to sell this medal a few years ago:

CONTROVERSIAL EMPEROR HIROHITO DEATH MEDAL

"Your life is as light as a feather, but your loyalty is as heavy as a mountain."
-- Hirohito, Emperor of Japan; addressing his subjects at the height of his power

This thick medal was struck for the Anglo-Japanese Numismatic Society upon the death of Japan's Emperor Hirohito. I believe at the time it was viewed with disgust by some of the old-guard imperialists who felt it was disrespectful to depict the Emperor's likeness on a medallion.

This fine memento mori is as large as an American silver dollar and has a reeded edge. It's in nice Extremely Fine condition.

Cornell's "Father and Regime" paints a picture of Hirohito's reign and the Imperial cult of personality:

Form of Authority

Before the 1945 defeat, Hirohito the Emperor
(1926-1989) portrayed himself as unsmiling,
distant, and god-like. Dressed in a military
uniform and frequently atop a white horse, he
was the head of an aggressive, imperialist state
that glorified war and sacrifice for Emperor and
country.

Deaths & Transitions

With the military defeat and allied occupation in
1945, Japanese imperial authority, along with
Emperor Hirohito, died a social death. Hirohito's
physical death came forty-four years later in
1989. For three days, TV networks stopped
regular programming and the public mourned. Six
weeks later there was a carefully orchestrated
funeral beginning with a private Shinto rites for the Imperial Family,
followed by a public and secular ceremony attended by international
dignitaries.

Consequences

After the defeat, the Allies stripped Hirohito of
power, but allowed him to retain his title as a
"symbolic" Emperor. Under American tutelage,
he cultivated a new image compatible with
that of the "democratic" Constitutional state.
Along with his wife Nagako, he traveled
throughout Japan, visiting with the people. His
once distant and god-like image was replaced by that of a smiling, gentle, grandfatherly
figure in civilian clothes. After his death in 1989, his son, Prince Akihito, was crowned
Emperor. The Japanese people transferred much of the loyalty once reserved for the
Emperor to the paternal corporation and embraced consumerism enthusiastically.

In 1989 writer Pavan Sahgal, in "Automation at the 'Big Four' Securities Firms", wrote this account (prescient of our more recent Y2K rumblings):

"Under Japanese custom, when a new emperor is crowned, his
reign or era is marked by a title that appears on all records in
the country. [Hirohito's era was called Showa, or peace.]

[E]xecutives at Tokyo's leading securities firms were
chagrined to discover that the computer programmers who wrote
accounting, recordkeeping and customer billing systems software
in recent years created inflexible systems. They did not
envisage that someday Japan would have a new emperor, and his
reign would mark the start of a new era requiring records and
statements to reflect that.

The dilemma is comparable to having a system that won't change
from 1988 to 1989. The programmers had overlooked an essential
detail that obviously has widespread fundamental implications.
Even worse, a new generation was sadly out of touch with custom
and the saying, Koin ya no-goto she ('A lifetime goes like an arrow')."

Is this medal a fitting tribute to one of the world's last emperors? Or is it a disrespectful temporal bauble, poor tribute to a man-god whose very image was once revered? That decision is left to the medal's new owner.