Tale of Genji lacquer display with hand painted shells

[Bibitte2]

Good morning,
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I got à superb set from an Estate sale last week.....
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The set is composed of 9 trays of 6 hand painted shells
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A box with cards that explain's each shells is also included in the set
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The owner payed more than 2000.00 for the set in the 1980 era...

Any help would be appreciated....

[KC]

Pictures would be even more appreciated! 

[mart]

Yes please pics !! My imagination is on vacation !!

[KC]

Just had to come back to this one.

Genji painted shells are actually VERY gorgeous!!!!  If you will note, these can be VERY old and VERY valuable!  Yours most likely were originally from a very old game (kai-awase) that was a matching game and was originally housed in a beautiful lacquer hexagon box.

 British Museum (Note the time period)
http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/asia/s/shell_game_box_decorated_with.aspx
Another
http://sites.asiasociety.org/arts/asiangames/match04.html

http://www.trocadero.com/stores/meijibijutsu/items/1056207/item1056207.html

There are specific characters for Genji and here is an abbreviated idea of them
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tale_of_Genji