An Obelisk to a Headmaster Who Abolished Examinations
The Meikyō Shizen Monument at Yokohama National University (横浜国立大学名教自然碑, Yokohama Kokuritsu Daigaku Meikyō Shizen Hi, also written Meikyo Shizen Monument) is a stone obelisk of 1937 standing on the Tokiwadai campus in Hodogaya Ward, Yokohama City, Kanagawa Prefecture, registered as a National Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 28 April 2000.
It commemorates Suzuki Tatsuji, first principal of Yokohama Higher Technical School, the institution that became the Faculty of Engineering and later the Faculty of Science and Engineering at Yokohama National University. The four characters cut into its face, 名教自然, were Suzuki's own coinage, arrived at while he ran both the technical school and the prefectural commercial and industrial school. Kanagawa Prefectural Shōkō High School, which he also headed, glosses the phrase as the proposition that fine education respects nature. In practice it meant that students should come to learning through their own volition.
Suzuki did not treat this as a slogan. He ran the school on what was known as the three-nothings principle: no entrance examinations, no marks, no rewards or punishments. For a state technical college in prewar Japan this was an extraordinary position, and the monument exists because his colleagues and graduates thought it worth cutting into stone.
The alumni association of the Faculty of Science and Engineering still uses the name Meikyō Shizen.
Three Hands on One Stone
The design came from Nakamura Junpei (1887–1977), professor of architecture at the school and the first head of its architecture department. Nakamura had gone to Paris in 1920 and entered the École des Beaux-Arts the following year, completing the course quickly and becoming the first Japanese architect to hold the French state diploma, the D.P.L.G. He returned convinced that architecture was an art before it was a technique, and taught in Yokohama on Beaux-Arts lines, drilling students in draughtsmanship and running all year groups together in a single atelier.
What he produced here is an obelisk, 6.6 metres high, cut in kansuiseki, a white crystalline marble. The national register describes the proportions as well composed and the handling of the material as making the most of it, and calls the effect a dignified commemorative presence. That is register language, but it is accurate. There is no sculpture, no relief, no ornament. The shaft does the work.
Three people put their marks on it. The four characters on the front are in Suzuki Tatsuji's own hand. On the reverse is a text composed by the journalist and historian Tokutomi Sohō, transcribed in formal kaisho script by Hara Sankei, the Yokohama silk merchant and art patron who created the Sankeien garden. A monument carrying the calligraphy of Hara and the prose of Tokutomi on the back and a Beaux-Arts architect's proportions in the mass is a fairly dense object for a campus lawn.
It was put up in November 1937, the year after the school's main building was completed as part of reconstruction following the 1923 Great Kantō Earthquake, an event Suzuki had lived through in Yokohama and which shaped the rest of his working life. Registration came under the criterion that the object would not be easy to reproduce, registration number 14-0039.
Finding It, and a Sibling in Another School Yard
The monument has moved once. It first stood inside the grounds of Yokohama Higher Technical School, in the Ōoka area of what is now Minami Ward, facing the building occupied today by the university's affiliated junior high school. When the university consolidated on the Tokiwadai campus it came with them, and it now stands at the centre of the science and engineering precinct.
The two official sources disagree on the year by one. The university's Facilities Department gives 1978, the year the Tokiwadai campus was completed. The national register gives 1979. Neither has been corrected against the other.
Visiting is straightforward and free. Tokiwadai is a working campus rather than a visitor attraction, so the practical position is that the grounds are generally walkable on ordinary weekdays while research buildings and classrooms are not open, and access is restricted on examination days and during closures. Check the university website before making a special trip. There is no admission charge and no booking. Photography outdoors is unproblematic. The nearest stations are Wadamachi on the Sōtetsu Main Line and Mitsuzawa-kamichō on the Yokohama Municipal Subway Blue Line, both requiring a walk uphill.
One footnote for anyone who becomes interested in Suzuki. A second Meikyō Shizen monument stands at Kanagawa Prefectural Shōkō High School, the successor to the other school he led. That one carries the four characters written horizontally; the university's is vertical. The high school monument is not a registered cultural property.
Hodogaya Ward also holds the brick wellhead shelters of the Nishiya Purification Plant, registered in 1997 and opened to public viewing in July 2026, if a day of the ward's registered structures appeals.
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Q&A
- Can the Meikyō Shizen Monument at Yokohama National University be visited, and is there a charge?
- Yes, and no. The monument stands outdoors on the Tokiwadai campus, which is generally walkable on ordinary weekdays with no admission charge and no booking, though research buildings and classrooms are closed to visitors and access is restricted on examination days and during university closures. Confirm on the university website before travelling.
- What does the phrase Meikyō Shizen mean?
- It was coined by Suzuki Tatsuji from his own teaching experience, and Kanagawa Prefectural Shōkō High School glosses it as the idea that fine education respects nature, meaning that students should come to learning through their own initiative rather than through compulsion.
- Who designed the Meikyō Shizen Monument?
- Nakamura Junpei, professor of architecture at Yokohama Higher Technical School and the first head of its architecture department. He studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris from 1921 and was the first Japanese architect to obtain the French state diploma D.P.L.G.
- What is written on the Meikyō Shizen Monument?
- The four characters 名教自然 on the front are in Suzuki Tatsuji's own hand. The reverse carries a text composed by Tokutomi Sohō and transcribed in formal kaisho script by Hara Sankei, the Yokohama businessman who created the Sankeien garden.
- Has the Meikyō Shizen Monument always stood on the Tokiwadai campus?
- No. It was erected in November 1937 within the grounds of Yokohama Higher Technical School in the Ōoka area, facing the building now used by the university's affiliated junior high school, and was moved to Tokiwadai when the campus was consolidated. The university gives the year as 1978 and the national register as 1979.
- How tall is the Meikyō Shizen Monument and what is it made of?
- It is 6.6 metres high, an obelisk form cut in kansuiseki, a white crystalline marble, with no carving or ornament beyond the inscriptions.
Basic Information
| Name | Meikyō Shizen Monument, Yokohama National University / 横浜国立大学名教自然碑 |
|---|---|
| Location | 79-5 Tokiwadai, Hodogaya Ward, Yokohama City, Kanagawa Prefecture |
| Designation | National Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structure), registration number 14-0039; criterion: not easy to reproduce |
| Year Designated | Registered 28 April 2000; gazetted 17 May 2000 |
| Quantity | 1 monument |
| Dimensions | Stone (kansuiseki marble), height 6.6 m, obelisk form |
| Owner | Yokohama National University |
| Public Access | Outdoors on the Tokiwadai campus; generally viewable on ordinary weekdays, free, no booking. Restricted on examination days and during closures. |
| Built | Erected November 1937; relocated to Tokiwadai (university: 1978; national register: 1979). Design: Nakamura Junpei |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs — Meikyō Shizen Monument, Yokohama National University
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00001567
- Cultural Heritage Online — Meikyō Shizen Monument, Yokohama National University
- https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/114647
- Yokohama National University, Facilities Department — Cultural Properties of the University: Meikyō Shizen Monument
- https://shisetsu.ynu.ac.jp/gakugai/shisetsu/2campus/bunkazai/yuukei/bunkazai_meikyou.html
- Kanagawa Prefectural Shōkō High School — On Meikyō Shizen
- https://www.pen-kanagawa.ed.jp/shoko-h/gaiyou/meikyousizen.html
- Osaka Museum of History — The Architect Nakamura Junpei: Architectural Education as Art
- https://www.osakamushis.jp/news/2020/tenjigae/200930.html
Last verified: 2026.08.14