Hino Family Residence Main House
The main house sits at the centre of the Hino family compound in Fukase, Kōda-chō, in the city of Aki-Takata, Hiroshima Prefecture. It faces south, presenting a long tiled roof to the garden that once opened before it. The current building was put up around 1779, in the eighth year of the An'ei era, when the family reduced an older and larger garden and rebuilt the residence on a fresh plan.
This is the Hino family formerly surnamed Nakamura, a household established in the seventeenth century whose first head is recorded as Shōbei Nagateru. The residence stands beside National Route 54, and its several buildings grew up around this central dwelling over more than two centuries.
The single-storey timber structure covers about 441 square metres, a scale rarely seen in a rural house. A later remodelling in 1936 refreshed parts of the interior without erasing the earlier framework.
Why It Matters
The building was entered on the national register of tangible cultural properties on 17 November 2015, under the criterion of contributing to the historic landscape of the country. It anchors a group of eight registered structures that together record how one family shaped a corner of the Chūgoku mountains.
What gives the house its interest is the meeting of two eras under one roof. The eastern earthen-floored doma reveals a heavy, exposed framework of beams in the manner of an early-modern farmhouse. West of it, the raised floor spreads into roughly four rooms arranged in four rows, a plan generous enough to serve a household that also ran regional enterprises.
In front of a twelve-mat room the family placed a tea room, and the reception rooms turn in an L-shape ringed by a veranda, with clerestory windows set high to draw in light. The result keeps the structural bones of a village house while admitting the refinement and airiness of a more modern age.
What to Look For
Seen from the road, the deep tiled roof and the horizontal spread of the elevation give the house a settled dignity. The line where the dark doma meets the bright raised rooms is worth pausing over, since it marks the join between working space and formal living.
The veranda and the clerestory lighting reward a slow look: they show how a nineteenth-century plan was adapted for comfort in the twentieth. From the surrounding fields the main house reads as the quiet centre around which the storehouses and gates are arranged.
The residence is a private property and is not generally open to visitors, so the buildings are best appreciated from the public road and the surrounding landscape they were registered to enrich. Travellers wanting a site they can enter will find the freely accessible ruins of Yoshida-Kōriyama Castle and the Aki-Takata City Museum of History and Folklore nearby.
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Q&A
- When was the main house built?
- It was rebuilt around 1779 and remodelled in part in 1936, so it combines an eighteenth-century plan with early twentieth-century adjustments.
- Can I go inside?
- No. The residence is privately owned and not generally open, though the exterior can be seen from the public road.
- What makes the interior notable?
- The eastern earthen-floored doma shows a heavy exposed beam frame, while the western rooms form a refined suite with a tea room, veranda and clerestory windows.
- What can I visit nearby?
- The ruins of Yoshida-Kōriyama Castle and the Aki-Takata City Museum of History and Folklore are both close and open to the public.
Basic Information
| Name | Hino Family Residence Main House / 日野家住宅主屋 |
|---|---|
| Location | 172 Kō and 172 Otsu (merged), Fukase, Kōda-chō, Aki-Takata, Hiroshima |
| Category | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (building) |
| Registered | 17 November 2015 (registration no. 34-0148) |
| Structure | Single-storey timber, tiled roof, floor area approx. 441 m² |
| Built | around 1779 (An'ei 8), partial remodelling 1936 |
| Access | Privately owned; not generally open to the public |
References
- 国指定文化財等データベース（文化庁） — 日野家住宅主屋
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00010891
- 安芸高田市 — 日野家住宅
- https://www.akitakata.jp/ja/shisei/section/kyouiku/shisekibunkazai/cultural_asset/r899/
- 文化遺産オンライン — 日野家住宅主屋
- https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/276956
Last verified: 2026.07.03