Miyake Family Residence New Rice Storehouse

About the Miyake Family Residence New Rice Storehouse

The Miyake Family Residence New Rice Storehouse (三宅家住宅新米蔵, Miyake-ke Jūtaku Shinkomegura) is a late Meiji-era earthen-walled rice store, built between 1898 and 1912, in Inarimachi, Kaita Town, Aki District, Hiroshima Prefecture, and was entered on the register as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on May 2, 2017. It is a Dozo-zukuri building with a tiled roof and a building area of 29 square meters.

The New Rice Storehouse stands in the middle of the Miyake plot on the east side, just south of the clothing storehouse. Its front faces west onto the passage, opposite the late Edo old rice storehouse, and it is close to the rear gate at the south end of the estate.

It is a small store, 3 Ken by 2, with a single room on each of its two floors.

Why It Was Registered

The Miyake Family Residence New Rice Storehouse was registered for its contribution to the historic landscape of the nation. The Agency for Cultural Affairs records that it held kosakumai, the rice paid in by tenant farmers.

Tenants who worked the Miyake family's fields paid their rent in rice each year, and this is where it was kept. Hiroshima Prefecture describes the family as landholders who also ran a money-lending business, and the New Rice Storehouse is the building that gives the landholding side of that description a physical form.

Of the four registered storehouses, this is the only one whose use the Agency states outright. It shows that a merchant house with a shop on the highway was also a landlord collecting rice from its tenants.

What to Look For

Two windows in the south gable

The windows of the Miyake Family Residence New Rice Storehouse open in the south gable end, two of them, rather than on the front facing the passage. One might guess they were placed to let air move through a store full of rice, but no source says so.

An eave along the front

The front facing the passage has an eave along its full length. The clothing storehouse just to the north does the same, so the two buildings on the east side of the passage present a continuous line of eaves.

Close to the rear gate

The New Rice Storehouse is the southernmost of the four storehouses, the one nearest the rear gate that once faced the riverbank. The gate includes a stable, and it is possible that bales of rice passed through it. No record of how the rice was actually moved has been found, however.

Visiting

The Miyake Family Residence New Rice Storehouse stands inside the grounds of a private house, and neither the grounds nor the building are open (checked September 27, 2026).

It sits on the east side of the internal passage behind the main house, with its eaved front facing west into the plot. Expect not to see it from the old Saigoku Kaidō, and please do not look into the grounds.