Tools of Culture

This important collection addresses aspects of Japanese human and material interactions in East Asia from the late eleventh through the late sixteenth centuries, a period coincident with Japan's late classical and medieval eras. The collection broadens our understanding of Japanese history, by departing from a traditional focus on Japanese history as a phenomenon essentially limited to the Japanese archipelago, and expands the horizons of that history to encompass the ubiquity of overseas contacts and the constant circulation of people, experiences, and objects. Each chapter provides a different perspective on the interactions--travel, trade, texts, religion, poetry, medicine, and art--rippling through Japanese society and across the waters that joined Japan and the continent.