This collection of rare materials brings together books, manuscripts, and maps produced during the 18th and 19th centuries that document Japanese exploration and observation of the island and prefecture now known as Hokkaido in Japan, as well as Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands in Russia. For several centuries these areas were inhabited primarily by Ainu peoples, who shared closely related languages, traditions, and modes of existence that were distinct from their ethnic Japanese neighbors to the south. Prior to and during much of the Edo period (1600-1868), the range of Ainu communities also extended south across parts of northern Honshu, the largest of the four major islands that comprise modern Japan, in addition to the eastern Amur River region and southern Kamchatka.