Memories of a “Christian Past” in Japan: The Museum of the Twenty-Six Martyrs in Nagasaki

Abstract

Inaugurated in 1962, the Museum of the Twenty-Six Martyrs of Nagasaki and its accompanying monument are dedicated to the memory of the first saints born from the mission in Japan: the Twenty-six martyrs of 1597 (beatified in 1627, canonized in 1862). Analyzing both the architecture and the nature of the collections of the museum, this article demonstrates how the entire structure was created, in the context of post-War Nagasaki, as something between a museum and a place of worship, and also as a “lieu de mémoire,” following the models of Jesuit spirituality, such as Louis Richeome’s La peinture spirituelle, or the Spiritual Exercises.