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Trip ideas  /  5 days in Tokyo  /  Tokyo National Museum
Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, Kanto
Museum · Tokyo, Kanto

Tokyo National Museum

An exhibition in 1872.A zoo beside the museum.Damage in 1923.89 National Treasures.

Photo: Wiiii, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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The start

A public exhibition in 1872 began the oldest national museum

The museum considers its origin to be the Yushima Seido Exhibition, a public exhibition of imperial artwork and scientific specimens held from 10 March to 30 April 1872. It admitted about 150,000 people.

150,000people admitted to the 1872 exhibition

The model

The Ueno museum was based on one in London, with a zoo

The early conception was based on the South Kensington Museum, now the Victoria & Albert Museum, in London. The collections were divided into eight categories. Emperor Meiji attended the opening of the museum and zoo on 20 March 1882.

The quake

The first Honkan was damaged in the Great Kanto earthquake

The original Honkan was severely damaged in the Great Kanto earthquake of 1923, and exhibits were moved to the undamaged Hyokeikan. The building had been promoted as having solidity matched by no other in Japan.

The Honkan

The present Honkan has a neoclassical base and a Japanese roof

In 1931 a design contest selected the Imperial-Crown plan from Jin Watanabe. The Honkan is a reinforced-concrete structure in the Imperial Crown Style, with a neoclassical base and Japanese roof. It opened on 10 November 1938 with Emperor Hirohito present.

The holdings

The museum holds about 120,000 Cultural Properties

As of April 2023 the museum held approximately 120,000 Cultural Properties, including 89 National Treasures and 649 Important Cultural Properties. It focuses on ancient and medieval Japanese art and Asian art along the Silk Road.

89National Treasures held as of April 2023

Day 1, afternoon

It comes after Ueno Park. Then Ameya-Yokocho.

More stories from this trip idea

The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Tokyo National Museum, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.

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