This paper examines how Matsuoka Joan (1668-1746), a scholar-physician during the Edo period in Kyoto, taught honzō (or, in early-modern Japan, herbal medicine or natural history) to his students using two books as primary sources about his teachings: Honzō kōmoku so (Explanation of Li Shizhen's Bencao gangmu [Classification of the materia medica]) and Bussan kanshiki (Judgment on natural products). The former tells that Matsuoka's lectures were like group reading sessions on Bencao gangmu, during which senior disciples were allowed to illustrate their own opinions. The latter shows that a student once asked Matsuoka about preceding studies and presented his original opinions by letters and meetings, occasionally with sample plants. Overall, especially regarding his relationships with senior students, Matsuoka Joan's honzō teaching can be characterized as sharing old knowledge and encouraging self-motivated research.

Up until recently, “Bouheisekki” was considered Yamamoto Youshitsu's notebook of written dialogues held between his father, Bouyo, and his students. Although at the beginning of the volume, the percentage of Bouyo's answers to his students was 100%, as the volume goes on, the number of Youshitsu's answers increases. In volume 28, 254 questions were written in it. Out of the 254, Youshitsu answered 126 of them, making almost half of the total answers written in volume 25.Details of Youshitu's hardships were recorded in a copy of his letter to a correspondent. According to Youshitsu's letter, he did not receive any payment for lecturing as a substitute instructor at Dokushoshitsu school.Youshitsu also suffere from severe poverty. In 1849, Bouyo asked all his sons to pay a highly monthly fee to stay in his home. Youshitsu agreed to Bouyo's idea but only succeeded in paying the first year's fees demanded by his father.

This article will introduce and analyze the manuscript “Sanbo Yōran” (handbook for women in sericulture) completed and prefaced by TAKEDOMI Kanryō, a Confucian scholar of the domain of Saga. It was written in the 6th month of the 15th year of Genroku (1702), only 5 months after the publication of NOMOTO Dōgen's “Kogai Yōhōki” (Method of sericulture), usually considered the first sericultural book in Japan. Chapter one presents an outline of the manuscript, a sketch of the author's life and his friendship with FUJII Ransai, the preface writer and a fellow Confucian scholar. In chapter two, the whole text of the manuscript is transliterated with detailed annotations based on bibliographical sources from Chinese agronomical books and Japanese waka literature. Chapter three examines the origins of the 15 plates illustrating the process of sericultural work, and also suggests, first, an affinity with the reprint-edition of Lou Shou's “Genzhi Tu” by KANOU Einou (Kyoto, 1676) and, second, the important role played in the production of the text by the cultural circle around FUJII Ransai and TAKEDOMI Kanryõ.

Introduction of the documents in Imahie-shrine.

These are documents more than several thousand, and their diverges into many branches. So in this report, I mainly introduce the documents which related to the foundation of Juge-sha in 1785.

In 1765, Houkoku-shrine's shintai (object of worship) was discovered in Imahie-shrine. Imahie-shrine and Myouhou-in founded Juge-sha which was shrine for Houkoku-daimyoujin. Juge-sha gained popularity in early modern period in Kyoto, but in modern period, Juge-sha leaved the foundation of Houkoku-shrine which was leaded by Meiji-government and Houkoku-kai.

This article will introduce Yamamoto Bōyō's handwritten directory of his students, correspondents and Kyoto-based hikyaku couriers, covering nearly 25 years from 1830 to around 1856. The manuscript is composed of 305 items and includes 132 students and exhibitors to the bussankai (naturalistic annual workshops) held in the Kyoto school or by related naturalist groups in Osaka, Ise and Nagasaki. The naturalistic activities of the Yamamoto School depended on the hikyaku courier system which facilitated nationwide scientifi communication and exchange of specimens with students and related scholars in 41 ancient countries from Ōshū to Satsuma. In this article, the human network of this school is analyzed and described using the directory, here transliterated, and new documents discovered in the Yamamoto family archives.