Scroll paintings of a national treasure, the "Tale of Genji," painted in the 12th century are the oldest existing scroll paintings in Japan.

 In 1999, a project to analyze and restore the scroll paintings was started by a team of specialists from different fields, i.e. scientists, researchers on art history, and painters. The background to this project's materialization was the improvement in analyzers.

 Conventionally, research and analysis of cultural properties are conducted by taking the work of art to a research institute where an analyzer exists. However, moving a national treasure is difficult from the viewpoint of its conservation. Many of the treasures are not movable, such as buildings and big statues of the Buddha, resulting in the irony that the more important a cultural property is, the more difficult it is to research it. Therefore the National Research Institute for Cultural Properties, Tokyo, started to develop a portable fluorescent X-ray analyzer. The apparatus was completed in 1999, and the first work analyzed was the scroll paintings of the Tale of Genji. There are three purposes for material examination of cultural properties, which are: 1） to use the same material for repair by determining the original material used, 2） to create a suitable environment （including temperature and humidity） for conservation through knowledge of the material, and 3） to contribute to judging the value of the work by knowing the work’s technical level.

 For the analysis to determine the pigments used in the scroll paintings of the Tale of Genji, a portable fluorescent X-ray analyzer was used for inorganic pigments, and fluorescent photography for organic pigments, and many facts were discovered. One of them is the design of the kimono the woman in Photo 1 is wearing. The design painted by organic pigment had become invisible to the naked eye due to the color fading （Photo 2）, but fluorescent photography, which can detect small amounts of remaining pigment in the fibers, clearly showed the design.

 By fluorescent X-ray analysis, various types of used pigment were clarified. Taking the white pigment used for faces, for example, it was newly discovered that white pigment containing hydrargyrum had been used in addition to three kinds of conventionally known white pigments. It was the first time to discover that what was used as face powder was also used in traditional Japanese paintings. The painting of the scroll paintings of the Tale of Genji, consisting of 54 volumes, is said to have been divided between some groups, and the discoveries made may provide new information to examine and research art history. By this project, reproductions were painted by Japanese-style painters by analytically determining the pigments and organic dyes to assume the color at the time it was painted and using the same pigments for the reproductions.

 The scroll paintings of the Tale of Genji, whose originals had given the image of faded color, were restored and revived in front of us in the 21st century to the state they originally were in the Heian period thanks to the achievement of analyzing technology.