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

1. Overview

The Shirai Bunko is a collection of about 6,000 volumes on honzo (materia medica) formerly owned by the botanist Mitsutaro Shirai (1863–1932). The collection was purchased between 1940 and 1942 (Showa 15–17). The Rare Books and Old Materials Room holds only Japanese and Chinese old materials; Western books from this collection are shelved together with the general collections of the National Diet Library.
The call numbers for most items in this collection begin with “特1”.

2. How to search

• On the NDL Search top page, click “Refiners” to open the simple search dialog, and search by entering “特1-*” (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 “白井文庫” (Shirai 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 - SHIRAI Mitsutaro

• Collection of Ex-libris Stamps - SHIRAI Mitsutaro

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

• Saori Toyoda, Ano hito no zosho (dai yon kai) Shirai Bunko (The Personal Libraries of Well-Known People (4): Shirai Bunko) (National Diet Library monthly bulletin No.721/722, May–June 2021, pp. 24–29 (NDL Call No. Z21-146)

• 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)