Rekihaku Databases National Museum of Japanese History

Overview

The Rekihaku Databases are a suite of online scholarly databases maintained by the National Museum of Japanese History (Kokuritsu Rekishi Minzoku Hakubutsukan), commonly known as Rekihaku, located in Sakura, Chiba Prefecture, Japan. The databases provide open and restricted access to digitized historical materials, artifact records, bibliographic data, and research outputs from the museum's extensive collections.

History and Background

The National Museum of Japanese History was founded in 1981 as an inter-university research consortium and opened to the public in 1983. It is situated on the former grounds of Sakura Castle. Since 1999, the museum has offered a doctoral program in Japanese History as a member of the Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI). The museum was a pioneering institution in the digital dissemination of Japanese historical research, developing extensive online databases of its holdings to broaden global scholarly access.

Collections and Holdings

The museum's overall collection encompasses approximately 230,000 items, including original artifacts, replicas, copies, and restoration models representing Japanese history from the Paleolithic era through modern times. The Research Library holds about 350,000 books, 6,500 periodical titles, and 170 microfilm titles in history, archaeology, and ethnology of Japan and neighboring countries. The Rekihaku Databases make portions of these holdings—including artifact records, digitized historical documents, and bibliographic references—available online. Databases are searchable via the nihuBridge cross-search system of the National Institutes for the Humanities (NIHU).

Access and Usage

The Rekihaku Databases are accessible at rekihaku.ac.jp/doc/t-db-index.html. Some databases are freely available to the public, while others require registration or onsite access. Photocopy services are available in accordance with Japanese copyright law.