Tsuchiura City Museum

The Tsuchiura City Museum is a municipal museum located in the central part of Tsuchiura City, Ibaraki Prefecture. Built adjacent to the site of Tsuchiura Castle (Kijō, 'Turtle Castle'), it collects and exhibits materials centered on the history and culture of Tsuchiura Domain. Tsuchiura Castle is a flatland castle (hirajō) protected by wide double moats, and it has been selected as one of the Continued Top 100 Japanese Castles (No. 113). The surviving Taiko Yagura-mon gate (drum-tower gate) is a designated cultural property of Ibaraki Prefecture, and the East and West Turrets have been rebuilt in wood. The museum is set within this historic environment and functions as a systematic collection base for materials on the governmental history of Tsuchiura Domain and samurai culture.

In its sword collection, the Tsuchiura City Museum is especially known for its holdings of swords and armor transmitted within the domain-lord house of Tsuchiura Domain, the Tsuchiya family. The Tsuchiya family was a fudai daimyo house that produced rōjū (senior councillor) for the Tokugawa shogunate, and many swords received as gifts or presents from the shogun's family and other powerful daimyo have been transmitted within the domain-lord house. Of the 85 swords held by the museum, the tantō 'Chikushū-jū Yukihiro' is designated a National Treasure, and the tantō 'Kunimitsu' (Shintōgo) and the tachi 'Nobufusa saku', 'Moriie tsukuru' and 'Tsunetsugu' are designated Important Cultural Properties. They are highly regarded as materials that directly convey the samurai culture of the Edo period.

The permanent exhibitions present the history and culture of Tsuchiura. On the first floor, 'Culture of the Daimyo Tsuchiya Family' presents the Tsuchiya family's swords, tea utensils and other items, and on the second floor, 'Life of the People Nurtured by Lake Kasumigaura' presents the town's history and culture. The displays are changed seasonally. The collection is also of high quality as castle-history material, and a tour course that combines it with the surviving structures of Tsuchiura Castle (including the Taiko Yagura-mon gate, a designated cultural property of Ibaraki Prefecture) has become one of the core destinations for castle and samurai-culture tourism in northern Kantō.

The location is highly convenient, about a 15-minute walk from Tsuchiura Station on the JR Jōban Line. Combined with the access from Ueno Station, about 50 minutes by limited express, it is easy to visit as a day trip from the Tokyo metropolitan area.