Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate

What the Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate is

Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate (教王護国寺南大門, Nandaimon of Tō-ji, also written Kyōōgokoku-ji) is a Momoyama-period eight-legged gate facing Kujō-dōri at Tō-ji in Kujo-cho, Minami Ward, Kyoto City, built in 1601 and designated an Important Cultural Property in 1910. It is three bays wide with a single passage, under a gabled Kirizuma-zukuri roof in Hongawarabuki tiles.

The Kyoto City Tourism Association describes it as the front gate of the temple's main compound. From here the Golden Hall, Lecture Hall, Dining Hall and Great North Gate follow in a straight line to the north, and the Great South Gate marks the southern starting point of that axis.

The gate you see today, however, was not built for Tō-ji. It came from another temple in the late 19th century.

A gate moved from Sanjūsangen-dō

Tō-ji's original south gate burned with the Golden Hall and Lecture Hall in a fire during the peasant uprising of 1486. According to Tō-ji, it was rebuilt after the Golden Hall's Momoyama-period reconstruction.

That rebuilt gate was lost to fire in 1868, according to the Kyoto City Tourism Association. As a replacement, and to mark the 1,100th anniversary of the founding of the Heian capital, the west gate of Sanjūsangen-dō (Rengeō-in), the temple famous for its long hall of a thousand Kannon statues, was moved here in 1895. That relocated structure is the present Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate.

The Agency for Cultural Affairs database dates the building to 1601. So it was put up as a gate for Sanjūsangen-dō in the Momoyama period and reassembled as Tō-ji's front gate nearly three centuries later.

According to the Kyoto City Tourism Association, the gate that burned in 1868 had housed guardian (niō) statues by the sculptors Unkei and Tankei.

The Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate as an Important Cultural Property

The Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate carries a designation date of August 29, 1910, 15 years after the move. The date comes from the era of the Ancient Shrines and Temples Preservation Law, and the Agency for Cultural Affairs records it as the gate's Important Cultural Property designation date.

An eight-legged gate has four main posts in a row along its center line, with four auxiliary posts in front and four behind. This one divides its front into three bays and uses the middle one as the passage.

The agency's database carries no commentary for this gate, so its reasons for the designation are not published. What it records is the date, 1601 in the Momoyama period, and the form, a three-bay eight-legged gate. Though moved from elsewhere, the gate still does the job a temple's main gate should, as the southern entrance to Tō-ji's compound.

What to look for

From across Kujō-dōri, the Golden Hall's roof shows above the gate, and you can take in the whole front of Tō-ji at once.

Under the Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate, count the posts: three rows of four, twelve in all, holding up the roof.

Stand in the middle of the passage and face north, and the Golden Hall lines up dead ahead. You are standing on the axis that runs on through the Lecture Hall.

Once inside the grounds, turn around to see the gate's inner face against the street behind it. An eight-legged gate is built the same way front and back, which you can confirm here.

Visiting the Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate

The Kyoogokokuji Temple Great South Gate faces Kujō-dōri, so its exterior can be seen from the street at any time. During the temple's opening hours, 5:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., you can walk through it into the grounds. There is no charge to see the gate.

The nearest city bus stop is Tōji Minamimon-mae.

The front of the gate is a public sidewalk, so keep clear of pedestrians when taking photos.