Zozan Shrine Saikan

What the Zozan Shrine Saikan Is

Zozan Shrine Saikan (象山神社斉館, Zōzan Jinja Saikan) is a 1938 priests' purification hall on the south side of Zozan Shrine in Matsushiro-machi, Nagano City, Nagano Prefecture, registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2005.

A saikan, also written 斎館, is the building where Shinto priests purify themselves and prepare in seclusion before a ceremony. The Zozan Shrine Saikan wraps Western-style rooms inside a Japanese exterior. It has a footprint of 205 square meters.

It stands northeast of the shrine office, and together the two form the working quarter on the south side of the grounds.

A Japanese Shell Around Western Rooms

The Zozan Shrine Saikan was registered on December 26, 2005 as number 20-0225, under the criterion of buildings that serve as a model of form.

From outside it looks thoroughly Japanese. The main roof is Irimoya-zukuri hip-and-gable, covered in Sangawara-buki pantiles, with a karahafu entrance porch at the front under a gable that curves up in the middle and sweeps down at the ends. A hip-and-gable wing projects to the south and a gabled wing to the north. The walls are Shinkabe, with posts left exposed, and square posts carry Funahijiki bearing blocks.

The proportions, though, are not those of a Japanese house of the period. The Agency for Cultural Affairs notes the building's tall build and vertical windows and records that the interior is fitted out as Western-style rooms. Put rooms with high ceilings inside, and the eaves rise and the windows stretch upward. That explains the slightly lofty look of the exterior.

The official description closes by calling it a building that combines Japanese and Western elements. That a 1938 shrine should give its priests Western rooms is itself a concrete record of how daily life was changing in those years.

Seeing the Zozan Shrine Saikan

At the front of the Zozan Shrine Saikan, start with the karahafu porch. Its undulating gable sits before the big hip-and-gable roof and gives the building its face.

Then look at the shape of the windows. Japanese houses tend toward wide, low openings; here they are tall and narrow, and the wall between window head and eave is tall too. Exposed posts combined with vertical windows are what make this building feel unlike its neighbors.

Compare the two wings as well. The south wing is hip-and-gable and the north wing is a plain gable, so the composition avoids strict symmetry.

Visiting the Zozan Shrine Saikan

No public opening of the Zozan Shrine Saikan interior, including the Western-style rooms, is advertised. The exterior can be viewed from the grounds at no charge.

Look for it on the south side of the grounds, northeast of the shrine office. Both are 1938 buildings with exposed posts and boat-shaped bearing blocks, yet the tall, tile-roofed saikan and the long, copper-roofed office make very different impressions, and seeing them side by side shows how each was designed for its own job. Directions and reception hours are on the Zozan Shrine page.