Ishiyakushi Bunko Reading Room

A Library a Poet Gave His Hometown

The Ishiyakushi Bunko Reading Room (石薬師文庫閲覧所) is the reading room of a small library beside the old Tokaido road at Ishiyakushi-cho, Suzuka City, Mie Prefecture, given to his hometown in 1932 by the poet and scholar Sasaki Nobutsuna to mark his sixtieth birthday, and was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property (structure) on October 28, 2011 (Agency for Cultural Affairs, Suzuka City).

The Agency for Cultural Affairs records it as single-storey timber with a slate roof and a building area of 29 square metres; registration number 24-0111, owned by Suzuka City.

Nobutsuna's Gift

According to Suzuka City, Sasaki Nobutsuna was born at Ishiyakushi in 1872, published a critical edition of the Man'yoshu and received the first Order of Culture in 1937. He gave the Ishiyakushi Bunko to his hometown in 1932 to celebrate his sixtieth birthday.

A poem by Nobutsuna expresses his wish that it be a good library for the people of his home village and for its young, and it is still loved as a local library (Suzuka City).

Value as a Registered Cultural Property

The Ishiyakushi Bunko Reading Room was registered as a structure contributing to the historic landscape of the country. With the main house and storehouse of his birthplace, it lines the old Tokaido and shapes the setting associated with Sasaki Nobutsuna (Agency for Cultural Affairs, Suzuka City).

What to Look For

The Agency for Cultural Affairs notes that it stands east of the storehouse beside the old Tokaido, with an L-shaped gabled slate roof and a lean-to in the inner corner forming the entrance. An anteroom lies behind the entrance, with the reading room to the south.

Cream mortar walls pierced by large windows give the Ishiyakushi Bunko Reading Room a bright interior (Agency for Cultural Affairs).

Visiting

According to Suzuka City, admission to the Sasaki Nobutsuna Memorial Museum is free, with viewing from 10:00 to 16:00. It is closed on Mondays, Tuesdays and the third Wednesday (open when only the Monday is a holiday) and over the New Year. Take the C-Bus from Kintetsu Suzukashi Station or JR Kawano Station to the Sasaki Kinenkan stop, about a 2-minute walk (Suzuka City).

The Ishiyakushi Bunko Reading Room forms the Sasaki Nobutsuna Memorial Museum with the main house and storehouse of his birthplace. See the group page Sasaki Nobutsuna Memorial Museum for all three buildings.