Kamakura

A Kamakura-period handscroll set at Shojokoji in Kanagawa. Its seventh scroll alone is held in Tokyo and recorded there as a wholly separate property.

A Kamakura-period portrait at Shomyoji in Yokohama, showing the fourth and last of the four generations among the commanders that are all kept there today.

A Kamakura-period portrait at Shomyoji in Yokohama, one of the four scrolls that together span four generations of a single warrior house in Kamakura.

A Kamakura-period portrait at Shomyoji in Yokohama, one of the four scrolls that together span four generations of a single warrior house in Kamakura.

A Kamakura-period inkstone box at Tsurugaoka Hachimangu in Kanagawa. Its own design reaches even a floor that is seen only when the tray is lifted out.

Two Kamakura-period handscrolls at Komyoji in Kanagawa Prefecture. A document dated to the year 1793 is designated alongside them here as an appendage.

Carved in 1308, the Anyo-in Hokyoin-to is Kamakura's oldest dated stone pagoda, an Important Cultural Property whose base records both its patron and its stonemason.

The main hall of Egara Tenjin in Kamakura, rebuilt in 1316 for Tsurugaoka Hachimangu and moved here in 1624, is a rare surviving shrine hall of medieval Kamakura.

The founder's pagoda at Kakuonji in Kamakura, Kanagawa, is a stone hokyointo of 1332, at the close of the Kamakura period, designated with the Daito Pagoda.

The Daito Pagoda at Kakuonji in Kamakura, Kanagawa, is a stone hokyointo of 1332, designated in 1934 with the founder's pagoda of the same year beside it.

Held at Kenchoji, this 1271 portrait of Lanxi Daolong is Japan's oldest dated Zen-master portrait. The monk inscribed it himself, and his eyes are ringed in gold.

Explore the silk portrait of Hojo Sanetoki at Shomyo-ji, Yokohama — a rarely-shown National Treasure depicting the Kamakura samurai-scholar who founded Kanazawa Bunko, Japan's oldest samurai library.

Five Kamakura-period silk court robes and lacquered arms, kept together at Tsurugaoka Hachimangu. Complete court dress of that age survives almost nowhere else.

Sacred arms offered to the war god Hachiman at Tsurugaoka Hachimangū: a vermilion bow, arrows, and gold-ground quivers and swords inlaid with mother-of-pearl.

Issued in January 1294 by Hōjō Sadatoki, ninth regent of the Kamakura shogunate, this ink-on-paper edict regulated the conduct of monks at Engaku-ji and other Zen monasteries. Designated an Important Cultural Property, it offers a rare window into the close ties between samurai power and Zen Buddhism in medieval Kamakura.

Preserved at Kenchō-ji in Kamakura, the National Treasure Daikaku Zenji Bokuseki (Hōgo Kisoku) is a pair of hanging scrolls written by Rankei Dōryū, the Chinese Chan master invited from Southern Song to found Japan's first pure Zen monastery in 1253. One scroll admonishes monks to devote themselves to practice; the other lays out the monastery's daily rules in remarkable detail. Executed in a calligraphic style derived from the Southern Song master Zhang Jizhi, the scrolls are both an unparalleled document of Kamakura-era Zen and a work of art.

Preserved at Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine in Kamakura, this National Treasure tachi was forged by Masatsune of the Ko-Aoe school in Bitchu Province during the Kamakura period. Offered to the shrine in 1736 by the eighth Tokugawa shogun, Yoshimune, at the rededication of its halls, the sword is admired for its distinctive chirimen-hada steel and graceful curvature, and is shown with its ornate silk-wrapped mounting in periodic special exhibitions at the Kamakura Museum of National Treasures.

Kōtoku-in's Great Buddha is a bronze Amida cast from 1252, about 11.3 m tall and 121 tonnes. Once housed in a hall, it has stood outdoors for over five centuries.

Discover the Bokuzeisho Volume 23 Fragment, an Important Cultural Property held by Shomyo-ji Temple and preserved at Kanagawa Prefectural Kanazawa Bunko. Explore how this rare divination manuscript reveals the scholarly world of medieval Japanese Buddhist learning.

A National Treasure bell cast in 1255 for Kamakura's Kencho-ji. Its inscription names patron Hojo Tokiyori, abbot Rankei Doryu, and founder Mononobe Shigemitsu.