Enomoto Family Residence

What Is the Enomoto Family Residence?

The Enomoto Family Residence (榎本家住宅, Enomoto-ke Jūtaku) is the estate of an old family on the west bank of the Tone River in Fusa, Abiko City, Chiba Prefecture; six of its buildings, dating from a storehouse of 1884 to a small Inari shrine of about 1958, became Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on 3 December 2024.

The six are the main house, the annex, the north storehouse, the kettle house, the main gate and the Inari shrine. The property backs directly onto the Tone River levee, and four of the buildings were moved to their present positions when that levee was widened. Abiko City treats the Enomoto Family Residence as a group of buildings closely bound up with the history of the river, and it is only the second nationally registered property in the city, after the Nemoto Family Residence.

A Family That Lived by the River Trade

According to Abiko City, the Enomoto family is said to have moved to Fusa in the 17th century from Tsuga District in Shimotsuke Province, in what is now Tochigi Prefecture. The family made its living from river transport on the Tone, the great waterway that carried cargo across the Kanto plain. In the late Meiji and Taisho eras it produced a mayor of Fusa Town and a member of the House of Representatives.

Living beside the river also meant living with its floods. Around Fusa, households raised their ground on artificial mounds called mizuka (水塚) as a defense against high water, and most of the Enomoto Family Residence, buildings and garden alike, stands on one.

The 1958 Levee Works and a House on the Move

The layout visitors would see today took shape in 1958. That year the widening of the Tone River levee brought with it a land readjustment project in Fusa, and the Enomoto family built up the main part of the site with fill and shifted buildings across it by hikiya (曳家), the technique of jacking a building up and rolling it to a new spot in one piece rather than taking it apart.

Abiko City gives the height of the mound as roughly 1.1 to 1.5 meters above the surrounding ground. The plot measures about 87 meters north to south and 62 meters east to west, a rectangle with one corner missing, and the mound covers roughly the eastern two thirds of it. The buildings cluster on top, toward the east side.

The sources disagree on which four buildings were moved. The Agency for Cultural Affairs database lists the main house, annex, north storehouse and main gate as relocated around 1958, describes the kettle house as altered at that time, and dates the shrine to the same years. A press release that Abiko City issued in July 2024 instead names the main house, annex, kettle house and main gate as the buildings moved. This page follows the Agency's record.

Six Buildings, Six Ways of Dating Them

All six buildings of the Enomoto Family Residence became Registered Tangible Cultural Property entries together on 3 December 2024, in the 108th round of registrations, under the consecutive numbers 12-0328 to 12-0333. The annex and the north storehouse were registered as models of fine design; the main house, kettle house, main gate and shrine for their contribution to the historic landscape.

The evidence for each date is different. Abiko City's press release explains that an ink inscription on the ridge beam fixes the north storehouse to 1884. The main house is placed in the early Showa era from its construction and from a zodiac year written inside a low cupboard on the upper floor, while the annex is dated to the middle of the Meiji era on style alone. The kettle house was dated by comparing the weathering of its timbers, the gate from old photographs, and the shrine from a site plan drawn in 1958.

• Main house: early Showa era, timber, 2 storeys, tiled roof, building area 56 square meters
• Annex: mid Meiji era, timber, single-storey, tiled roof partly clad in copper, building area 55 square meters
• North storehouse: 1884, earthen-walled, 2 storeys, tiled roof, building area 20 square meters
• Kettle house: early Showa era, timber, single-storey, sheet-iron roof, building area 31 square meters
• Main gate: early Showa era, timber, tiled roof, frontage 2.8 meters
• Inari shrine: about 1958, timber, copper roof, building area 1.0 square meters

How the Estate Is Laid Out

The main gate of the Enomoto Family Residence stands back from the street and faces south. The forecourt in front of it climbs from the road up the slope of the mound and is paved with cut granite.

Beyond the gate the main house runs east to west, with a lawn spreading to its south and a large crape myrtle in the middle. The annex joins the main house on its west side; from a big stepping stone at the edge of the annex veranda, a path of stepping stones leads out into a front garden set with rocks and stone lanterns. The north storehouse stands north of the annex, the Inari shrine to its west, and the kettle house to the northeast of the main house.

Further out, the back garden is used partly for growing vegetables and has large zelkova and chinquapin trees. Off the mound, an outer garden keeps a rectangular pond with stone-faced banks. Abiko City presents these grounds as the Enomoto Garden (榎本氏庭園).

Visiting and Getting There

The Enomoto Family Residence is a private home and is not open to the public. Both Abiko City's heritage page and its press release say so plainly, and no public viewing days were announced in the sources checked for this article.

Photographs of each building, including several interiors, can be seen in the Agency for Cultural Affairs database and on Cultural Heritage Online. Abiko City's page on the Enomoto Family Residence also shows the main house and the main gate.

The nearest station is Fusa on the JR Narita Line, the branch that leaves the Joban Line at Abiko and heads toward Narita. The house lies about 600 meters east-northeast of the station as the crow flies, right against the Tone levee. The surrounding streets are residential, so please stay off private land and keep noise down.