A small storehouse built to outlast floods
At the southeast corner of the Akagi family compound stands a compact earthen-walled storehouse barely sixteen square meters in plan. It measures two ken by two ken, roughly 3.6 meters on each side in the traditional bay unit, yet it carries an upper floor across its eastern half. For generations it held the rice that tenant farmers handed over as annual land tax.
This is the Higashi Momigura, the East Rice Storehouse. Momi means unhulled rice, still in its husk, and a momigura was the building where a landlord family kept the grain it collected. The Akagi were ōjōya, the senior village headmen who administered tax and local affairs first under the Tokugawa shogunate and then in the early Meiji state. A storehouse like this sat at the practical center of that work.
How it was built
The walls use dozō construction: a timber frame packed and coated in thick layers of earth, then finished on the outside in white lime plaster, called shikkui, that resists both fire and damp. The roof is a separate structure raised above the building, a method known as oki-yane, literally a "placed roof." The air gap left between the tiled roof and the plastered walls below kept rain off the earthen surface and let the storehouse breathe, which mattered for grain that had to stay dry through the seasons.
The roof is gabled and laid with sangawara, the interlocking pantiles that spread across rural Japan in the nineteenth century. On the long western side a pair of heavy earthen-faced doors swings open; a single window pierces the east face. Inside, the walls are lined with boards rather than left as bare plaster, a finish meant to keep sacks of rice away from the cold sweat of an earthen interior.
Records place its construction in the middle Meiji period, the decades around the 1880s and 1890s, when the family was extending an estate that had taken its present shape from 1870 onward.
An estate engineered against the river
The storehouse was added to the register of Tangible Cultural Properties in 2006, under the criterion that recognizes structures contributing to the historical landscape of the country. This designation, introduced in 1996, is lighter than the Important Cultural Property system. It protects buildings through notification and guidance rather than strict permits, and it was created to save the large stock of everyday historic architecture that formal designation tends to overlook.
What gives the East Rice Storehouse its weight is the property around it. The Akagi compound sits beside the Maruyama River, a waterway long known for flooding, and the whole estate was shaped to withstand it. Basalt stone walls lift the grounds about two meters above the surrounding fields, and the household is said never to have been flooded out. A grove of bamboo planted on the river side broke the force of the current, and a small boat hung ready under the eaves of a storehouse, its rope easy to slip so it could be launched the moment the water rose.
The estate is also the birthplace of Akagi Masao (1887–1972), the engineer remembered as the father of sabo, Japan's discipline of erosion and sediment control. He worked to tame the very river that ran past his childhood home, and it was largely through his efforts that the word sabo entered the international vocabulary of civil engineering. Growing up inside walls built against the water, it is often said, set the course of his life.
- 📍 Plan Your Visit to Hyogo
- Find tours, activities & transport passes near Akagi Family Residence Higashimomikura
- [ Himeji Castle & Kobe Night View Cruise ]
Q&A
- Can I go inside the storehouse?
- The Akagi residence is a private home and is not generally open to the public. The grounds can be seen, however, by visiting the Akagi Masao Sabo Memorial Exhibition Hall, which stands on the same property and opens on Fridays and Saturdays by advance reservation. Confirm days and hours before you travel.
- What is a "placed roof," and why does it matter here?
- An oki-yane sits as a separate roof above the storehouse box, leaving an air space over the earthen walls. It shields the plaster from rain and helps control humidity inside, a sensible choice for a building meant to keep rice dry for long stretches.
- How does this small building connect to Akagi Masao?
- The storehouse is one of the working buildings of the estate where Masao was born. His later career in flood and erosion control is usually traced back to a childhood spent on a property organized entirely around the threat of the Maruyama River.
- What else stands on the grounds?
- The main house dates to 1870, and a detached shoin room, gates, walls, and several storehouses were built through the middle and late Meiji years. Many of these structures, including this one, are registered together as cultural properties.
Basic Information
| Name | Akagi Family Residence, East Rice Storehouse (Akagi-ke Jūtaku Higashi Momigura) |
|---|---|
| Location | 972 Hikino, Toyooka City, Hyōgo Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (registered March 2, 2006; gazetted March 23, 2006) |
| Registration No. | 28-0229 |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Period | Middle Meiji period (1868–1911) |
| Structure | Earthen-walled (dozō) single story with tiled roof; building area approx. 16 m²; two ken by two ken, gabled, pantiled placed roof, upper floor over the eastern half |
| Access for visitors | Private residence, not generally open. Grounds viewable via the on-site Akagi Masao Sabo Memorial Exhibition Hall (Fri and Sat, advance reservation; check current details) |
References
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, National Cultural Properties Database: Akagi Family Residence East Rice Storehouse
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00005319
- Tajima Encyclopedia (Tanshin Regional Development Foundation): Akagi Family Residence
- https://tanshin-kikin.jp/tajima/564
- Tajima Tabi Net (Tajima Tourism Association): Akagi Masao, the "god of sabo"
- https://tajima-tabi.net/publictopics/376148
- Sediment Disaster Prevention Public Relations Center: Akagi Masao Sabo Memorial Exhibition Hall
- https://www.sabopc.or.jp/category/砂防の父 赤木正雄展示館/
Last verified: 2026.06.22