Important cultural property

Gifu's Nagataki Hakusan Shrine holds 27 wooden masks from late Kamakura to late Edo — Okina, Sanbasō, kishin and rare hanataka faces of Hakusan worship.

The Akagi Family Residence in Tsuno, Miyazaki, is an 1844 merchant house that also lodged daimyo as a honjin. See its guest rooms, storehouse and stone-based barn.

Raised in 1919 by a Kushima family enriched by forestry, the Former Yoshimatsu Family Residence keeps all five buildings. An Important Cultural Property since 2008.

Kurasaki Lighthouse on a cliff in Nichinan, Miyazaki, first lit in 1884 for the Yokohama to Hong Kong route, has one of the earliest concrete towers in Japan.

Koda Shrine's main hall in Miyazaki is a rare medieval shrine in southern Kyushu, dated by ridge tags to 1448 and restored to its red-lacquer and gold-leaf finish.

Kodama Shrine's inner sanctuary in Miyakonojo is Miyazaki's oldest dated wooden building, a 1399 Buddhist tabernacle saved by villagers during the Meiji purges.

Takachiho Shrine's 1778 main hall in highland Miyazaki is a grand five-bay nagare-zukuri in plain zelkova, carved with dragons, a phoenix, and a local hero's legend.

Shiiba's Nasu Family Residence, an 1823 Important Cultural Property, is 25 meters long yet one room deep, and known as Tsurutomi Yashiki after a Genpei-era legend.

Dated to 1787 by a carved post inscription, this is Miyazaki's oldest documented farmhouse: no doma, just two board-floored rooms in an archaic mountain plan.

The main hall of Mikado Shrine in Misato, Miyazaki, at the eastern foot of the Kyushu Mountains, is a seven-bay nagare-style hall of 1661, dated by its ridge tags.

The Agatsuma Family Residence in Zao, Miyagi, is a 1753 thatched farmstead with three storehouses, protected with its gate and lot and open on third Sundays.

Amida hall in Kakuda, Miyagi, said to date from around 1177 and the oldest building in the prefecture: a plain thatched hall on huge pillars housing a great Amida.

Thatched farmhouse of the later Edo period in the grounds of Kozoji, Kakuda, Miyagi, with a three-room plan, a large earth floor and thick posts; free to visit.

Shiogama Shrine in Miyagi keeps fourteen buildings and a torii, from worship halls of 1663 to the three main halls completed in 1704 by the Date lords of Sendai.

A yakuimon gate of about 1609 at Zuiganji in Matsushima, reserved for the emperor, imperial family and lord, with a heavy tiled roof and white taikobei walls.

Date Masamune's 1604 hall on an islet in Matsushima Bay, reached by the Sukashi-bashi bridges, with zodiac carvings and Five Wisdom Kings shown every 33 years.

A four-legged gate of about 1609 before Zuiganji's main hall in Matsushima, the temple's only shingled roof, with an open frame and inventive carved brackets.

Built around 1887 for missionaries and designated an Important Cultural Property in 2016, this colonial timber house in Sendai is a rare early foreign residence.

Completed in 1888 to a design by Yamazoe Kisaburo, this wooden schoolhouse in Tome City became an Important Cultural Property in 1981 and now houses a museum.

A late Edo thatched farmhouse designated an Important Cultural Property in 1974, the Former Nakazawa Residence in Natori keeps the local four-room plan.