Former Ajisaka Family Residence

Former Ajisaka Family Residence

The Former Ajisaka Family Residence (旧鯵坂家住宅, Kyū Ajisaka-ke Jūtaku) is a house compound of the late Meiji period (1898–1912) in the Kaseda Fumoto district of Kaseda Takeda, Minamisatsuma City, Kagoshima Prefecture, whose main house, storehouse, gate and stone wall were registered as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on June 21, 2013 (Agency for Cultural Affairs). All four belong to Minamisatsuma City.

The Kagoshima Prefectural Board of Education describes it as a samurai-style house built around 1902. Its rooms have walls coloured vermilion and finely worked transom panels, the stone walls and hedges are said to date from the time of construction, and the compound is one of the component properties of the Japan Heritage story "Defense Network of Satsuma Samurai Districts FUMOTO in the Edo Period".

In Kagoshima a fumoto was the samurai quarter of a local stronghold: under the Satsuma domain's outer-castle system, the Shimazu lords kept their samurai in such districts across the province rather than in a single castle town (Japan Heritage).

The House of Ajisaka Shoichiro

A chronology compiled by Minamisatsuma City also calls the compound the former house of Ajisaka Shoichiro. A walking map of Kaseda Fumoto produced by a Kanagawa University laboratory says Shoichiro, a headmaster of Kaseda Elementary School, built the house around 1903. His younger brother Shigehiko later became head of the family and, across the road and the canal, built the Former Ajisaka Clinic, a separate registered building listed in 2009.

The same chronology explains how the Former Ajisaka Family Residence survived. In 2008 local residents began a campaign to keep it; the next year residents, a non-profit group and a university carried out emergency repairs. Residents petitioned the city in 2010, the city bought the property in 2012, and the four structures were registered the following year.

Layout of the Compound

Read together, the Agency's notes describe the layout of the Former Ajisaka Family Residence. The main house stands in the middle of the plot facing south, and the storehouse sits in the south-east corner. The gate opens at the southern end of the west side, on the city road, and the stone wall runs along that road and beside a path inside the plot.

The main house is a single-storey timber building under an hip-and-gable roof of pantiles, with a building area of 224 square metres. The storehouse is a two-storey building of clay-walled storehouse construction covering 63 square metres, the gate is an Udekimon 1.9 metres wide, and the stone wall is 52 metres long in total (Agency for Cultural Affairs). Each has its own page with the details.

Walking along the road, you meet the tuff wall first, then the gate at its southern end; the main house and storehouse lie behind them.

Kaseda Fumoto

Kaseda Fumoto grew from a samurai settlement around a medieval hill castle, and its curving streets and plot lines still follow the land as they did in the Edo period (Minamisatsuma City). The Masuyama irrigation channel and its stone bridges, the stone walls and hedges that divide the plots, and gates with cantilevered beams make up the townscape.

The Agency notes that the main house of the Former Ajisaka Family Residence preserves the house type of Kaseda Fumoto, and that the stone wall shows how Kaseda households laid out their plots. What was registered, in other words, is not only a house but the way the whole compound faces the street.

Visiting

The Former Ajisaka Family Residence is closed until further notice while the city carries out works to open it to the public (Minamisatsuma City notice updated January 22, 2026). No reopening date has been announced, so check with the Cultural Affairs Section of the Minamisatsuma City Board of Education (tel. 0993-76-1810) before you go.

Because the gate and stone wall stand on the city road, their street side can be seen from the road. No official information on entering the grounds or on photography was found.

According to the Japan Heritage guide, the direct Shinkansen Relay bus from Kagoshima-Chuo Station reaches the Kaseda bus centre in about 60 minutes, and the drive from Kagoshima-Chuo Station to Kaseda Fumoto also takes about 60 minutes.