International Symposium in Hirado

On February the 9th an International Symposium was held at the Hirado Dutch Trading Post in which various researchers presented their latest findings, all using non Japan based documents. The theme of the symposium was: International Port City Hirado and its Interest in Foreign Cultures – Foreign Sources Changing Japanese Historical Research.

The symposium is part of a project that is currently carried out by the International Research Center for Japanese Studies, also known as Nichibunken in Japan, in which previously unstudied documents related to the early period of the Hirado Dutch Trading Post are research and translated into Japanese. This research project is carried out by Frederik Cryns of Nichibunken and Cynthia Vialle of Leiden University and will present its final findings after the project is finished in another few years.

Hopefully the documents will shed new light on the relative unknown early period of the Hirado Dutch Trading Post.

Details of the symposium are noted below. International Symposium

Hirado: International port city and its interest in foreign cultures

- Foreign sources changing Japanese historical research -

Date: February 9, 2019

Venue: Hirado Dutch Trading Post

Organisers:

- National Institutes for the Humanities (NIHU) Network-based Transdisciplinary Project: “International collaborative Research and Utilization Project of Japan-related Documents and Artifacts Held Overseas”

- International Research Center for Japanese Studies

Co-organisers:

- Hirado City Hall

- Matsura Historical Museum

- Hirado Dutch Trading Post

Programme

Keynote Lecture:

Matsura Seizan and the Hirado Dutch Trading Post era

By Kiyoshi Matsuda:

Lectures:

Early period of the Hirado Dutch Trading Post (1609-1621)

By Frederick Cryns and Cynthia Vialle