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Shii News – Academic Items

1.New Version of the Daiber Collection Manuscript Database Released

The Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia at The University of Tokyo is pleased to announce the release of the beta version (public test version) of the new Daiber Collection database, which provides access to approximately 520 Arabic-script manuscripts held by the institute. Nearly two decades have passed since the launch of the original database, and a comprehensive update is now underway to enable more advanced use.

This upgrade is being carried out in collaboration with the Uehiro Project for the Asian Research Library (U-PARL) and the Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology, both within The University of Tokyo.

On June 30, 2025, we released the first phase of the beta version of the new database, and we warmly invite all users to participate in its testing. This initial release features manuscripts No. 1 through No. 50 from Collection I of the Daiber Collection (which consists of two parts). Additional updates will be made on a regular basis.

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Call for Cooperation in “Cultivating” the Beta DatabaseThe beta version of the database is an open-ended archive that will grow through the active contributions of a diverse range of stakeholders. We warmly welcome feedback on metadata corrections and general impressions of the beta database. Please share your thoughts using the following form: https://u-parl.lib.u-tokyo.ac.jp/ja/contact . Kindly use “Regarding the Daiber Collection” as the subject line.

Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, The University of Tokyo

 

 

 

 

 

2. V&A collections are open for researchers again!

In case you haven’t heard the news, the V&A collections which were previously stored at Blythe House, and which have been inaccessible for about the last six years, are open again for study appointments! So as you make your plans for summer research trips, factor in the fact that you can finally come and study all those V&A objects you have been unable to access in recent years.

Object study appointments will now mostly take place at the fabulous V&A East Storehouse, which is a brand new visitable storage facility in Stratford, East London, part of the regeneration of the London Olympic site:

https://www.vam.ac.uk/east/storehouse/visit

No appointment is necessary to visit Storehouse itself, which is also free of charge. It has many amazing objects to discover around the public walkway in the central hall. These are all presented through the lens of the ‘working museum’, and include many objects related to Islamic art history, not least the Agra Colonnade and the Torrijos ceiling.

This is where you will also go for most study appointments, and these can now be booked through the new Order an Object service:

https://www.vam.ac.uk/info/order-an-object

You can order upto 5 objects at a time, and you can have appointments of 1 to 3 hours in length. You can book adjacent appointments with different objects and over contiguous days.

The Order an Object service will be available 7 days a week at Storehouse, and will also operate at the V&A South Kensington on Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays.

You might find that some objects are not available via this service. This is probably because the object has been assessed as being too fragile for public consultation. In this case, please contact the curators as you have done in the past! We will do what we can to arrange access appointments for you.

We are looking forward to welcoming researchers back into the V&A collections!

URL

https://www.vam.ac.uk/east/storehouse/visit

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