Introduction

The first modern archives in Japan were set up in Yamaguchi prefecture in 1959. The trigger for the adoption of the idea ‘archives’, when only libraries or museums had existed, was the deposit of the Mōri Family Papers to the prefecture in 1952. The Mōri family were feudal lords who governed the Yamaguchi prefecture area and the papers were administrative records of the Mōri clan in the early modern era, comprising 50,000 items. The best way to preserve and utilise this priceless collection was explored and the director of the prefectural library at that time came across the idea of archives. He studied western literature on archival science to design the system.

The National Archives of Japan was set up in 1971. The system was based on western archival science, including T. R. Schellenberg's Modern Archives, which was translated and studied while planning the establishment of the National Archives.

Since then, many archival institutions have been created in both the public and private sectors. The concept of the archival system is now more or less rooted in Japanese society, but there is a tradition of a kind of amalgamation of history compilation and archival functions. In this chapter the background which led to shape this tradition is analysed and its possible future development is discussed.

History compilation in Japan

The official history compilation tradition in East Asia

The influence of Chinese culture is historically dominant in East Asian countries and the compilation of official history of the rulers is a part of it. The oldest existing chronicle in China is Chunqiu [Spring and Autumn Annals], which is a chronicle of the Lu dynasty from 772 BCE to 484 BCE. However, it is understood that the earliest official history is Shiji [Records of the Grand Historian] and the 24 titles, including Shiji, are together called 24 Official Histories. They cover the years from circa 90 BCE to 1739 CE (Takeuchi, 2002, 2–4, 102–3).

The essential nature of the official history is that it is a project of the imperial order. Although the first four titles were originally written by individual historians and officially approved after completion, later systems included the emperor's order for the compilation of the history of the preceding dynasty.