Edo

Built in 1727 as Kasuga Taisha's fourth sanctuary and moved to this Yagyu village shrine in 1747, this one-bay kasuga-zukuri hall can be viewed at close range.

Built in 1627 in the Hōryū-ji precinct, the Ritsugakuin Hondō mirrors the nearby Shōryōin. This Important Cultural Property enshrines an image of Prince Shōtoku.

The main hall of Renchoji, a Nichiren Buddhist temple in Nara's Aburasaka-cho, is an Important Cultural Property of Japan believed to have been originally built by Toyotomi Hidenaga and relocated here in 1653. Its open-front corridor features magnificent polychrome ceiling paintings of celestial maidens, dragons, phoenixes, and kalavinka. Just a 4-minute walk from Kintetsu Nara Station, this hidden gem offers free admission in a tranquil setting.

Kōriyama Castle in Nara, a National Historic Site, preserves walls built partly from reused Buddhist statues and an inverted Jizō, remains of a Toyotomi power base.

The formal gate of a senior headman's compound in Yoshino, Nara: a zelkova-framed yakuimon with a copper roof and twenty metres of plastered wall beside it.

Built in 1773 for a senior village headman below Mt. Ryumon in Nara, this thatched Yoshino farmhouse keeps stopped door grooves and a formal entrance board.

A late Edo document storehouse in Yoshino, Nara, built to guard a village headman's papers from fire and damp with an air-gapped roof and interlocking doors.

A small late-Edo storehouse in the Ota brewery courtyard in Tatsuta, Ikaruga. Its sea-cucumber plaster and framed doorway show a care that earned its listing.

A long late-Edo shed at the Ota brewery in Tatsuta, Ikaruga, linking the old kitchen to the inner storehouse. One side is open, the other a boundary wall.

The main house of the Ota sake brewery in Tatsuta, Ikaruga. A roof-tile inscription dates it to 1829, a rare benchmark for dating the region's town houses.

A late-Edo tea room at the Ota brewery in Tatsuta, Ikaruga, behind the main house across a courtyard. Its three-mat plan and crawl-in door reveal the family's wealth.

Discover the Sanmon Gate of Jōkyō-ji Temple in Nara, a Registered Tangible Cultural Property from the late Edo period. This elegant yakuimon gate features exquisite carvings and stands on the historic Sanjō-dōri, where Ernest Fenollosa delivered his landmark lecture on preserving Japan's cultural heritage.

Tamaya Hanare Zashiki is a detached guest room of a former Edo-period inn standing before Taima-dera in Katsuragi, Nara. Designated a Registered Tangible Cultural Property, it offers visitors a chance to dine in a quiet, 170-year-old pilgrim's retreat surrounded by a courtyard garden.

This late Edo townhouse in Naramachi, Nara, keeps its projecting eaves, udatsu fire walls and a large lattice window. Registered in 2012, it still sells Yamato tea.

At Chuguji in Ikaruga, Nara, this late Edo shoin hall has six rooms for receiving noble guests, one raised under a coffered ceiling. Registered 2006. Rarely open.

Dated to 1855 by the wand set in its roof frame, the main house of Hirai Clinic in Gojo, Nara was registered in 2002. A smoke vent rides its long gabled ridge.

The 1855 storehouse behind Hirai Clinic in Gojo, Nara, carries a stepped ridge line: rice filled the eastern half of the building and raw cotton the western half.

A 35-square-metre guest wing at Anashi in Sakurai, Nara, dated 1830-1867 and registered in 2004. Its eight-mat room carries an alcove, shelving and a writing bay.

A National Treasure: a Southern Song edition of Ouyang Xiu's works, edited by Zhou Bida, once in the medieval Kanazawa Bunko library and nearly complete at Tenri.

Discover the Song Edition of Liu Mengde's Collected Works, a National Treasure held at Tenri University Library in Nara. Printed in 12th-century China, brought to Japan by Zen master Eisai, and once admired by shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, this rare printed book offers a remarkable glimpse into the literary exchange between Tang China and medieval Japan.