Jomanji Temple Bell Tower

Nineteen square metres of 1796

Jomanji Temple Bell Tower (常満寺鐘楼, Jōmanji shōrō) is a bell tower of 1796 standing in the precinct of Jōmanji, a Jōdo-shū Seizan Zenrinji-ha temple in Inuyama City, Aichi Prefecture, and it was listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on December 5, 2007. The building sits south of the main hall with its ridge running east to west. It is single-storey timber construction with a floor area of nineteen square metres.

Its type is the hakamagoshi bell tower, named for the flared skirt that encloses the lower structure like the pleated trousers of the same name. Above that skirt sits the open frame that carries the bell. Roofs of this type are Irimoya-zukuri, hipped-and-gable, and this one is covered in Sangawara-buki pantiles.

The upper stage is one bay square and completely open, with no walls at all. A veranda runs around all four sides. The posts are square rather than round, and almost everything worth looking at happens where those posts meet the eaves.

Reading the eaves

The Agency for Cultural Affairs description of Jomanji Temple Bell Tower is unusually specific about carpentry: square posts tied by a head-penetrating tie beam and a flat plate above it, three-block bracket sets, frog-leg struts in the intercolumnar position, single-tier widely spaced rafters, and lattice panels in the gable ends. Taken in order, that list explains what the builders chose and what they left out.

The head tie beam runs through the tops of the posts to lock them together laterally; the flat plate, or daiwa, lies on top of it. Doubling up in this way keeps an open frame from racking. The less wall a building has, the harder this joint has to work, and a bell tower has none at all.

The bracket sets are the three-block variety: a large bearing block, an arm across it, and three smaller blocks carrying the eaves purlin. This is a single-step arrangement rather than the three-tiered brackets that step out over the eaves of a formal Zenshūyō hall. Between the posts sit Kaerumata struts, broad shaped boards with legs splayed to either side, which spread load and decorate at the same time.

The eaves use one tier of spaced Taruki rafters. A double tier would have read as deeper and grander. The gable ends are filled with kitsuregōshi, a close lattice of slender members. Nowhere does the carpenter reach for carving; the surfaces are made by how the timber is assembled.

When the Agency's summary calls the roof slope generous, it means the pitch that this deliberately light frame carries. Against a footprint of nineteen square metres, the roof looks considerably larger than the building underneath it.

Why it was listed, and what it lived through

The registration number is 23-0267 and the criterion applied is the one for buildings that contribute to the historic character of the national landscape. The registration date is December 5, 2007, with the gazette notice on December 19 of the same year. This is registration rather than designation: a lighter scheme introduced in 1996 that works by notification, assumes continued use, and asks owners to report substantial changes to the exterior.

The official summary describes Jomanji Temple Bell Tower as a building that gives the precinct its character. The value being recognised is contextual as much as architectural. This tower belongs to its courtyard.

That courtyard changed drastically in 2018. According to the temple's own website, Jōmanji suffered a fire that year, and the main hall and guest hall were rebuilt by 2023. Inuyama City's published register of listed properties now records two buildings at the temple: this bell tower, 23-0267, and the main gate, 23-0270. Very little else in the precinct is eighteenth-century fabric.

What to look at

Closed below, open above

Seen from below, the solid skirt and the open upper stage read as a pair. The lower half is sealed, the upper half is emptied out. The reason is acoustic, since walls would muffle the bell, and the result also defines what a bell tower looks like.

The veranda on all four sides is where the person swinging the striker stands. It is working floor, and from outside it also draws a line right around the building's waist.

Get low and look up

The bracket sets and the Kaerumata struts are tucked under the eaves, so from a distance the roof hides them. Step closer and raise your eyeline into the eave soffit and the sequence resolves: bearing block, arm, three blocks. The struts sit mid-span, so find the posts first and look between them.

Walk round to the gable

Because the ridge runs east to west, the gables face north and south. The lattice panels are there, invisible from the front. Circle the tower. At one angle the shadow of the roof frame shows through the slats.

The gate next door

Jomanji Temple Bell Tower comes into view as soon as you pass under the temple's main gate, a former Inuyama Castle gate moved here in 1877 and listed in its own right. Two buildings a few dozen metres apart, one from a castle and one built for this temple, now share a precinct.

Visiting

The temple website gives precinct hours as 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. daily. No admission charge is published. The bell tower stands in the open, so it can be approached and studied during those hours, though there is no interior visit as such.

The bell is rung for services and temple events, so visitors cannot simply strike it. There is one published exception: the website advertises a December bell-ringing gathering, held ahead of New Year's Eve rather than on it, and states that anyone may take part. Dates shift with the weather and the temple calendar, so check the notices before travelling. This information was confirmed on August 31, 2026.

No photography rules have been published. Shooting the exterior is not normally an issue, but avoid pointing a lens into the halls or at people attending a service, and ask at the temple office if you are unsure.

Jōmanji is about a ten-minute walk from Inuyama Station on the Meitetsu Inuyama Line. Head into the old castle town and turn west off Ōhonmachi-dōri, the street one block west of Honmachi-dōri. Free parking is available inside the precinct, and the castle keep lies roughly 600 metres north.