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The Edo-Tokyo Museum Library

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 June 2016

Momoko Tateishi
Momoko Tateishi*
Affiliation:
Edo-Tokyo Museum Library, Yokoami 1-4-1, Sumida-ku Tokyo 130-0015, Japan
*
Email: tateishi@edo-tokyo-museum.or.jp
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Abstract

The Edo-Tokyo Museum Library is the specialist library of a museum that opened in 1993, and that has a particular focus on the history and culture of Tokyo (known in pre-modern times as Edo). It houses a collection of books, documents, secondary materials and microfilms covering history, performing arts, customs and traditions, architecture, literature and much else. The Library’s holdings are a part of the Museum’s collections; we record them and store them, making them available for public consultation on the understanding that they are objects to be treated with care, preserved for future generations, and may also be used in the museum exhibitions. At the same time, we also make a point of collecting art exhibition catalogues, and we have characteristics of an art library. On the eve of our 20th anniversary our operations are due for a review, but here I will concentrate on giving a brief summary of our activities.

Type
Research Article
Information
Art Libraries Journal , Volume 38 , Special Issue 2: Special Issue: Art Documentation in Japan , 2013 , pp. 21 - 25
Copyright
Copyright © The Art Libraries Society 2013

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References

1. http://www.edo-tokyo-museum.or.jp/english/.Google Scholar
2. Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and the first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate, which ruled Japan from the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 till the Meiji Restoration of 1868.Google Scholar
3. From the ‘Basic Plan for the Construction of the Edo-Tokyo Museum’ (in Japanese), produced by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Bureau of Citizens and Culture, in 1988.Google Scholar
4. Originally built in 1603, this bridge became the starting point of two highways, and one could say that the city of Edo grew up around it. A famous landmark of Edo, the bridge features in many woodblock prints of the period. In 1911, the wooden bridge was replaced by a stone one, which still stands today.Google Scholar
5. Books produced before 1868, the start of the Meiji period, are stored in the museum. Books published after 1868, bound in the western style, and microfilms, are stored in the Library. Internal estimates of the numbers of volumes held are (as of March 2012): books, 85,000; catalogues (exhibition catalogues, etc.), 16,000; secondary publications, 180,000; western and Chinesebooks, 1,300; microfilms, 10,000.Google Scholar
6. Hokusai, Katsushika, well-known ukiyo-e artist of the Edo period. Perhaps best known for his ukiyo-e series 36 Views of Mount Fuji.Google Scholar
7. Some of our holdings are accessible online in the Tokyo Digital Museum, which allows users to search the Edo-Tokyo Museum, the Edo-Tokyo Open-Air Architectural Museum, the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, all run by the Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture, http://digitalmuseum.rekibun.or.jp/.Google Scholar
8. http://edo-tokyo-museum-lib.opac.jp/.Google Scholar
9. The ALC is a consortium that enables cross searches for museum libraries in the Tokyo metropolitan area. As of April 2012, participating libraries are: the National Museum of Modern Art, the National Art Center, Tokyo, the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, the Yokohama Museum of Art, the National Museum of Western Art, the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, the Tokyo National Museum, the Edo-Tokyo Museum, and the Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura and Hayama. See http://alc.opac.jp/.Google Scholar
10. Tokyo Shiryō Search (‘Tokyo Materials Search’) enabled Japanese-language searches across the holdings (roughly 3,750 million books) of six libraries that acquire and provide documents and data on the Tokyo metropolitan areas, http://www.library.metro.tokyo.jp/edo_tokyo/tokyo_search/tabid/3443/Default.aspx. In December 2011, Tokyo Shiryō Search became part of the Tokyo Metropolitan Library’s integrated search facility, http://ufinity01.jp.fujitsu.com/metro/.Google Scholar
11. NACSIS-CAT is Japan’s largest union catalogue database and is run by the National Institute of Informatics.Google Scholar
12. http://www.edo-tokyo-museum.or.jp/floor/library/.Google Scholar
13. The NDL is constructing this collaborative reference database with other participating libraries. It is a database that allows users to search for and locate materials, http://crd.ndl.go.jp/jp/public/.Google Scholar
14. Kurihara, Tomohisa, ‘Thoughts on networking the displays in the Library (Appended to the Report on the One-Theme Tours),’ Outline of the Edo-Tokyo Museum, no. 2 (2012): 117–127. (In Japanese)Google Scholar