Mitesaki

What mitesaki is

Mitesaki is a Kumimono that projects in three steps to carry the eaves. Blocks and arms step forward three times between the column head and the eaves edge. It is the deepest of the projecting types, and it allows the deepest overhang.

Pagodas use it. The three-storey pagoda at Chinzanso in Tokyo, built in the late Muromachi period and moved to its present site in 1925, is described as based on the Wayō manner with Zenshūyō details added, with brackets of this type and closely spaced parallel Taruki at every level. All three tiers are carried this way.

So do two-tier gates. The gate at Imamiya Shrine in Kyoto, built in 1926, is described as a three-bay gate with one opening, Irimoya-zukuri and copper-roofed, its lower tier carried on three-step brackets at the balcony with elaborate long-legged Kaerumata, and its upper tier on three-step brackets with tail rafters.

A tail rafter projects diagonally forward from within the bracket set to help carry the eaves. Deep projections of this kind normally use them.

Its place in the sequence

Bracket sets are named by how far they project. An arm laid on the column head comes first, then Mitsudo-gumi, then one step of projection, then two, and this type at three. The number of steps corresponds to the scale and standing of the building.

It can be combined with dense setting. The bell tower at Shorenji in Kagawa Prefecture, built in 1910, is described as an open bell tower, Irimoya-zukuri with Hongawarabuki, its slightly splayed square posts tied by three levels of beams, with three-step brackets carrying double tail rafters set densely along the wall and fan-set rafters in two tiers. The entry calls it a well-proportioned building in the Zen manner.

On site, look up under the eaves and count the steps. Three stages of blocks and arms climbing outward from the column head identify the type, and the deep overhang above is its visible consequence.