Considered by some to encompass the author's most significant research to data, this in-depth gateway study of Edo travel literature examines fifteen of the period's most notable travellers, some of whom are known as intellectuals, artists, and poets, or as folklorists and natural scientists, but rarely, if at all, as travellers. The author's research, which has considerable interdisciplinary appeal, takes us from civil servant and botanist Kaibara Ekiken (1630-1714) to former priest, intellectual, and government official Matsumura Takeshiro (1818-1888).