THE TERM ‘BOOK learning’ is often used derisively to describe knowledge that, while scholarly, is impractical. The well-known nineteenth-century British engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806–1859), for example, lampooned what he considered a French over-reliance on books for training engineers, advising his apprentices that ‘a few hours spent in a blacksmiths and wheelwrights’ shop will teach you more practical mechanics’. There is a tendency to see the written word as the province of scholars, and embodied skills as the realm of the artisan. However, certainly in the case of early modern Japan, this would be to disregard the diverse types of publications produced by artisans, as well as the practical endeavours of the scholarly classes. Increasingly, attention is being paid to the ways in which practical knowledge is circulated in print. However, qua books – as material objects – technical manuals can also tell us much about the nature of the communities that use them. This exploration of translated technical manuals in nineteenth century Japan therefore adopts a ‘visual’ approach that highlights the materiality of these objects. This approach reveals facets of the technical community in Japan, such as how professional identities emerged and changed over time, the role of print in establishing professional authority, and the role of language in shaping professional identity.

The increasing appearance of foreign ships in Japanese coastal waters from the late eighteenth century was a catalyst for the study of new languages, including French, Russian, English and Manchu. The shogunate also started hiring translators to work in its Astronomy Bureau (tenmonkata) in Edo. Despite Western military threat being the impetus for this activity, few of the works translated under the auspices of the Astronomy Bureau focused on defence. Indeed, one of the largest projects conducted by the Bureau was a translation of a Dutch work based on Noël Chomel's Family Dictionary, which ultimately resulted in a 102-volume work in Japanese. Many scholars involved in this project also pursued private scholarship. Much of this focused on the history and geography of foreign countries, as well as on military matters, but there was also an interest in production techniques that could be adopted by artisans.

One translator who turned his attention to glassmaking techniques, Baba Sadayoshi (1787–1822), produced Biido seihō shû setsu (A collection of glass production methods) in 1810.