This book is an illustrated and expanded version of a slightly earlier geographical encyclopaedia also by Nishikawa, called Kai tsushoko, published in 1695. It was the first of its kind to deal with foreign countries other than China or Korea. The illustrations are:
A map of China
Two single page illustrations of a Chinese man and woman
Four illustrations of Chinese boats
A world map
A Chinese man and woman
A Dutch man and woman
An Asian boat
A Dutch ship

For fully illustrated copies of both Zoho kai tsushoko and Kai tsushoko in the collections of Waseda University Library go to:
http://www.wul.waseda.ac.jp/kotenseki/html/i13/i13_00581/index.html
http://www.wul.waseda.ac.jp/kotenseki/html/ne01/ne01_04067/index.html

Provenance:
James E. Fagan (1926-2011) was an American collector with a special interest in the introduction of Western culture and technology to Japan’s closed Edo-era society (1603-1868), also known as the Tokugawa period. Mr Fagan studied Japanese language and history at Stanford University, and served as a US Naval officer in the Pacific theatre. He then lived and worked in Japan as an attorney in the 1950’s and 1960’s.

During this time, Fagan assembled and researched his collection of rare Edo-era woodblock and manuscript maps, prints and books not available outside Japan. Highlights include Nagasaki-e (showing the Japanese fascination with the Dutch East Indies (VOC) outpost at Deshima island), early Rangaku examinations of Western science and languages, the evolution of Japanese cartographic knowledge, and the study of English and Russian military might and technology. Imaginative illustrations and maps, from Japanese castaways reporting back to the Japanese Court, also provide a glimpse of how the Western world appeared to the first Japanese to circumnavigate the globe.

The collection demonstrates Japan’s keen curiosity about the Western world during its long isolationist period, and the artful way the Japanese perspective captures the impact of European contact.