Kamakura

On the back of the Akihagi-jo handscroll lies a Tang copy of the Huainanzi's military chapter, older than the poems on its front. Both sides are National Treasures.

Brushed in 1124, this is the oldest surviving Zen calligraphy. Cut in two long ago, its front half is National Treasure number one, the supreme tearoom scroll.

A Kamakura warrior's horse-tack set at Tokyo's Musashi Mitake Shrine, the gilt-bronze saddle inlaid with iridescent shell circles, designated a National Treasure.

At the Tokyo National Museum, this Tang scroll is the oldest surviving copy of the early Tang writer Wang Bo, brushed around 685 to 689, a decade after his death.

Two white-bronze mirrors at the Tokyo National Museum, donated to Hōryūji by Empress Kōmyō in 736. Their backs cast a Daoist realm of sacred peaks and seas.

A katana attributed to the Kamakura smith Masamune, shortened in 1609 and gold-inlaid by appraiser Hon'ami Kotoku. Once held by warrior Jo Kagemochi, now in Ueno.

A National Treasure katana by Mitsutada of Bizen, prized for its flamboyant clove temper line. Now unsigned, it bears a gold attribution by Honami Kotoku.

A National Treasure katana attributed to Sōshū Sadamune, heir to Masamune. A tortoiseshell crest carved on its shortened tang gives the blade its lasting name.

An unsigned katana by Masamune, Japan's most celebrated swordsmith. Shortened to 64.4 cm and once owned by the Kanze Noh family, it is a National Treasure in Tokyo.

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 Southern Song tea caddy at the Nezu Museum, an Important Cultural Property since 1959, handed down from Ashikaga Yoshimasa to the Matsuya family of Nara.

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.

A Tang-dynasty handscroll at the Tokyo National Museum, a National Treasure since 1954, copying in regular script a score for the zither piece Elegant Orchid.

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.

Painted by the Song court artist Li Di and dated 1197, this National Treasure pairs a white and a red cotton rose, one flower as it shifts colour across a day.