This webpage introduces the Ito Bunko (Ito Collection), which is held by the Rare Books and Old Materials Room of the Tokyo Main Library.

1. Overview

The Ito Bunko comprises about 2,000 volumes of honzo (materia medica) collected by the herbalist Keisuke Ito (1803–1901) from the late Edo through the Meiji period, and later owned by his grandson, Atsutaro. The collection was purchased in 1944 (Showa 19).
The call numbers for most items in this collection begin with “特7”.

2. How to search

• On the NDL Search top page, click “Refiners” to open the simple search dialog, and search by entering “特7-*” (prefix search) in the Call number field and selecting “Tokyo Main Library > Rare Books and Old Materials Room” in the Location field.
  If you do not see the search fields you need, you can add them by customizing the search fields.
  Search results

• With some exceptions, the note field of the bibliographic records contains the phrase “伊藤文庫” (Ito Bunko), which you can also use as a keyword for searching.

• For information about printed catalogs in booklet form, please refer to section “4. Catalogs.”

3. How to use

• Most items in this collection have been digitized. For digitized materials, follow the links to the NDL Digital Collections from the search results obtained as described in section “2. How to Search.”

• For information on how to use other materials, please refer to the webpage for the Rare Books and Old Materials Room of the Tokyo Main Library.

4. Catalogs

• Honzo kankei tosho mokuroku: Kokuritsu kokkai toshokan shibu ueno toshokan shozo (Catalog of books related to honzo (materia medica): holdings of Ueno Library, Branch of the National Diet Library) (revised and enlarged ed., Tsukasa Shobo, 1976, NDL Call No. M1-42)

5. References

• Portraits of Modern Japanese Historical Figures - ITO Keisuke

• Collection of Ex-libris Stamps - ITO Keisuke

• Digital exhibition “Fauna and Flora in Illustrations – Natural History of the Edo era –” > Collection introduction > Ito Bunko
  Some items from the Ito Bunko are introduced here with explanatory notes.

• Kokuritsu kokkai toshokan shozo kojin bunko ten: tenjikai mokuroku [sono 1] (Seio gakujutsu no tsuikyu) (Exhibition of personal collections held by the National Diet Library: exhibition catalog [no. 1, In pursuit of Western scholarship]) (National Diet Library, 1982.10, NDL Call No. UP72-42)