Category:Illustrated Handscroll of The Tale of Genji

English: The twelfth century Illustrated Handscroll of The Tale of Genji ranks as a masterpiece in Japanese art and the most famous object in The Tokugawa Art Museum collection. Only sections from three of the scrolls handed down in the Ōwari branch of the Tokugawa family and from one scroll long held by the Hachisuka family (now in the Gotoh Museum) survive today. These are the earliest known paintings, and in fact earliest extant text, of The Tale of Genji. This National Treasure is too vulnerable to light and air to be continuously on display, and is therefore never shown in public, only as fascimiles.