National Treasure

Tarōsaku Masamune is a National Treasure katana attributed to Gorō Nyūdō Masamune, the late-Kamakura master who perfected the Sōshū tradition. Named after the Tokugawa retainer Mizuno Tarōsaku Masashige, the sword passed through the shōgunate and was presented in 1633 to the Maeda lords of Kaga, who have preserved it ever since. Owned by the Maeda Ikutokukai Foundation in Tokyo, it is exhibited periodically at the Sonkeikaku Bunko Branch within the Ishikawa Prefectural Museum of Art in Kanazawa.

A National Treasure attributed to the elusive smith Gō Yoshihiro, this 64.8 cm blade passed from Hideyoshi to the Maeda lords. Edo appraisers declined to price it.

At the Tokyo National Museum, this Kamakura National Treasure sets shell cart wheels in a dense gold ground, bolder and more ordered than its Heian twin.

A 12th-century Heian National Treasure at the Tokyo National Museum, covered with ox-cart wheels half-sunk in flowing water in gold lacquer and rare shell inlay.

Compiled in 905 for Kanzeon-ji of Dazaifu, this three-scroll National Treasure lists its halls, statues, estates and clergy, now at Tokyo University of the Arts.

An 11th-century draft handscroll at the Tokyo National Museum, copying a court poetry contest of around 889-893, with ink deletions and unfinished verses visible.

A National Treasure at the Nezu Museum, this 11th-century handscroll copies a Buddhist sutra in graceful wayo calligraphy on dyed gampi paper flecked with gold.

A small ink scroll the Chan master Xutang Zhiyu brushed near age eighty for a Japanese monk, slashed by a servant in 1637 and now a National Treasure in Tokyo.

Volume nine of the Yupian, a Chinese dictionary lost in China, survives in Japan as a Tang scroll. This Waseda National Treasure bears a Buddhist text dated 1021.

At the Tokyo National Museum, the gilt Dragon-Head Ewer fuses a Persian form, four engraved Pegasus, and an East Asian dragon. A National Treasure from Hōryū-ji.

Fujiwara no Teika's autograph diary of Retired Emperor Go-Toba's 1201 pilgrimage to Kumano, a National Treasure full of weary complaints and admired calligraphy.

Brushed in 1325 by the Yuan master Gulin Qingmao for his disciple Betsugen Enshi, this farewell verse, once owned by Oda Nobunaga, is now a National Treasure.

Compiled for Tang emperor Taizong in 631 and lost in China, this fifty-volume statecraft anthology survives as thirteen Heian scrolls on dyed, gold-ruled paper.

A pictorial Yayoi bronze bell at the Tokyo National Museum, said to come from old Sanuki, its six panels engraving deer hunts, herons, a granary and grain-pounders.

Discover Jieshi Diao Youlan Daiwo, the world's oldest complete instrumental music manuscript. This 7th-century guqin tablature, designated a National Treasure of Japan, is preserved at the Tokyo National Museum in Ueno, Tokyo.

Three National Treasure scrolls of the Sutra of the Wise and the Foolish, written in the Nara period in oversized characters on paper once thought to hold relics.

An eighth-century Kengukyo handscroll in oversized characters, long ascribed to Emperor Shomu. One of the few Daishomu scrolls left whole, rarely shown in Tokyo.

Watanabe Kazan's 1837 portrait of scholar Takami Senseki blends Western facial shading with East Asian brushwork. A National Treasure at the Tokyo National Museum.

The original seventh scroll of the Ippen Hijiri-e is kept apart from its set, at the Tokyo National Museum. The 1299 silk scroll shows the dancing nembutsu in Kyoto.

Just 24.2 cm tall, this National Treasure at Tokyo's Nezu Museum is a peak of Southern Song bird-and-flower painting, attributed to Li Anzhong and shown only rarely.