Founded in 1959, the Japanese Studies Library offers some 45,000 volumes and is open to all researchers for loan and consultation: its holdings include works on Japanese history, religion and literature from Antiquity to the end of the Edo period (1867). The library's mission is twofold: to build up a high-level reference collection and to provide researchers with the most comprehensive and up-to-date bibliographical information.
In addition to around a hundred ancient Japanese books (wakosho), since 2002 the library has held a private collection, the Louis Kreitmann Collection, named after a polytechnicien who spent time in Japan between 1876 and 1878 as an engineering officer. The collection includes, among other items, two albums of 19th-century photos of Japan (around 500 shots) collected or taken by Louis Kreitmann, as well as four original collections of illustrations (theatrical costumes, portraits of foreigners, imaginary creatures) from the Tayasu family, one of the branches of the Tokugawa family, two illustrated scrolls (emaki), old maps, etc. The inventory of this collection and part of the digitized holdings can be consulted on Salamandre.
The library also offers access to online resources such as the JapanKnowledge database, which provides access to dictionaries (historical, language, who's who, etc.), encyclopedias, collections of classical works (Toyo bunko), and the list of sales of old Japanese books (Kôbunsô Taika Koshomoku, unique in France).
The library seats 58, including 3 carrels and two group-work rooms in a reading room shared by the five Asian Worlds libraries.
In October 2022, the library was awarded the " CollEx-collectionsd'excellence " label by the Collex-Persée scientific interest group. This label identifies research-level holdings that are remarkable for their scope and originality, and enables the labeled library to be associated with national projects for mapping and digitizing holdings, or to participate in calls for projects involving researchers.
