仙台市博物館

Sendai City Museum, located on a wooded hill adjacent to Sendai Castle (Aoba Castle), is the central cultural institution preserving the history and legacy of the Date clan, who ruled the 620,000-koku domain of Sendai for the Edo period's entirety. As the spiritual home of DATEKATANA, this museum embodies the sword culture at the heart of our mission. The museum's approximately 90,000-item collection centers on materials donated and entrusted by the Date family, including around 130 Nationally Designated Important Cultural Properties. Highlights include swords actually worn by successive Date lords, armor said to have been worn by Date Masamune himself, and the world-renowned materials related to the Keichō Embassy to Europe (1613), in which Masamune dispatched his retainer Hasekura Tsunenaga to negotiate with the King of Spain and the Pope — a UNESCO Memory of the World. The museum's connection to legendary blades such as Okurikara and Shokudaikiri Mitsutada (the latter now at the Tokugawa Museum) makes it essential for anyone seeking to understand the sword culture of the Date domain. The adjacent Sendai Castle ruins with their iconic equestrian statue of Masamune offer a complementary experience of Tohoku's greatest warrior lord.