- Other Names: 洋学所 (yôgakusho)
- Japanese: 蕃書調所 (Bansho shirabesho)
The Bansho Shirabesho (roughly, "Institute for Examination of Foreign Books") was an institute established by the Tokugawa shogunate for the study and teaching of Western Studies.
Originally established in 1855 as the Yôgakusho (roughly, "Western Studies Institute") on the former site of a firefighters' station in Ogawamachi, in the Kanda neighborhood of Edo, the institute was moved in 1855/12 to the former site of the residence of Nakaoku koshô Takemoto Masatsune, at Kudanzaka.
Scholars such as Koga Kin'ichirô and Mitsukuri Genpo were appointed to prominent positions in the school.
The institute was renamed the Bansho Shirabesho in 1856/2, and was relocated yet again, later that month, to a different site within the Kudanzaka-shita neighborhood. An explanatory plaque marking the former location of the institute stands today just outside Kudanshita subway station, near the Shôwakan museum/archives.
References
- Ishin Shiryô Kôyô 維新史料綱要, vol 2 (1937), 102, 110, 121, 156, 168, 172.