Japanese museums

Japan was introduced to the idea of Western-style museums (hakubutsukan 博物館) as early as the Bakumatsu (幕末 ) period through Dutch studies.

Upon the conclusion of the US-Japan Amity Treaty in 1858, a Japanese delegation to America observed Western-style museums first-hand.

Following the Meiji Restoration, botanist Keisuke Ito, and natural historian, Tanaka Yoshio, also wrote of the necessity of establishing museum facilities similar to the ones found in the West. Preparations commenced to construct facilities to preserve historical relics of the past.

In 1872, the Museum of the Ministry of Education (Monbusho Hakubutsukan 文部省博物館) staged Japan’s first exhibition in the Yushima area of Tokyo. Minerals, fossils, animals, plants, regional crafts, and artifacts were among the articles displayed.

Following the Yushima exposition, the government set up a bureau charged with the construction of a permanent museum. The bureau proposed that in keeping with Japan’s participation in the Vienna World Fair of 1873, a Home Ministry Museum (now, the Tokyo National Museum) eventually be developed.

In 1877, the Museum of Education (Kyoiku Hakubutsukan 教育博物館)opened in Ueno Park (now, the National Science Museum of Japan) with displays devoted to physics, chemistry, zoology, botany, and regional crafts. As a part of the exhibition, art objects were also displayed in an “art museum.”

The Imperial Household Department oversaw the establishment of a central museum dedicated to historical artifacts in 1886. In addition, in the years after 1877, there was great enthusiasm for establishing regional museums in Akita, Niigata, Kanazawa, Kyoto, Osaka, and Hiroshima.

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Wikipedia