Kyoto University Library Network

938 new items have been released in Kyoto University Rare Materials Digital Archive: 477 writings by royalists from "Collage on Folding Screens, Meiji Restoration Collection", and 461 Korean rare books from "Kawai Collection" and others digitized in collaboration with Korea University.
As of December 12, 2018, Kyoto University Rare Materials Digital Archive has 1,047,928 images of 11,350 titles, surpassing the one million mark.

■Collage on Folding Screens (Meiji Restoration Collection) 477 titles
Viscount Yajiro Shinagawa, who had collected relics of late royalists during the Meiji Restoration and founded Sonjodo, organized letters, petitions, memorandums, paintings and poems by the royalists and posted them on folding screens in order to secure their long-term preservation. Presently there exist 23 folding screens among “Meiji Restoration Collection”: 21 consisting of six panels each and the rest, two panels each. The records of the writings in the digital archive include the images of the individual writings and the folding screens on which they are posted.

■Korean Rare Books (Kawai Collection and others) 461 titles
Kawai Collection consists of Korean rare manuscripts and books formerly held by Dr. Hirotami Kawai (1872-1918) who studied mainly history of Korea and its economy. Then Kyoto Imperial University (presently Kyoto University) bought the collection from his family in 1919 and has preserved it since then. The collection is indispensable in the research of Korean society, culture and especially finance, because it covers many fields such as official and private records, politics, economy, religion and customs. The items newly released this time are 461 titles of Korean rare books from Kawai Collection and others digitized under the collaborative project between Kyoto University Library, the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University and the Research Institute of Korean Studies, Korea University.

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