This paper reviews the contributions to disater management made by seismology based on historical documents and artifacts. The main task was to predict when, where, and how large future earthquakes would be based on knowledge of past earthquake diasters and geographical observations for earthquake prediction. They have been the main information source for medium and long-term earthquake predictions for occurrence. As for location and maginitude, it has been the main information source for identifying maximum credible earthquakes in each region. It also helps to recommend wise land use planning by avoiding active fault zones to mitigate future damage. As a further potential application, it could be used to give us an account of how people and society responded to the catastrophic disasters in the past to give us a lessons for improving preparedness for the next disaster.
