National Treasure
国 宝 一 覧Browse Japan’s National Treasures by prefecture, period, and type. Clear stories highlight what to look for at temples, shrines, castles, and museums—plus maps and travel tips.
Two Heian goddesses enshrined with a monk-form Hachiman in Toji's guardian shrine in Kyoto, said to be carved by Kukai and called Japan's oldest Shinto sculptures.
The principal Thousand-Armed Kannon at the centre of Sanjusangendo in Kyoto, made by Unkei's son Tankei in 1251 to 1254 and flanked by a thousand standing Kannon.
Sanjusangen-do's 1,001 standing Thousand-Armed Kannon include 124 Heian figures saved from the 1249 fire. The full set became a National Treasure in 2018.
A ninth-century National Treasure at Koryu-ji, this 266 cm Thousand-Armed Kannon was carved from a single cypress block and shows eleven faces and forty arms.
Near Tofuku-ji in Kyoto, Hosho-ji keeps a National Treasure Senju Kannon of the tenth century, cut from one cherry block, bearing some twenty-seven faces.
At Kyoto's To-ji, the seated image of Hachiman as a Buddhist monk is among Japan's oldest surviving Shinto deity sculptures, a record of how the two faiths merged.
A Heian National Treasure, the wooden canopy of Tō-ji hangs above a secret Fudō Myōō in the Mieidō. Unseen by the public, it is one of few ranked as sculpture.
Over the gilded Amida in Byodo-in's Phoenix Hall hangs a 1053 National Treasure: a shell-inlaid black-lacquer square canopy holding an openwork floral round canopy.
Tobatsu Bishamonten at Kyoto's To-ji, a Tang-dynasty National Treasure that once guarded Rashomon gate. The 189.4 cm figure stands on the palms of the earth goddess.
At Kyoto's Sanjusangen-do stand the Twenty-Eight Attendants, National Treasure guardians of the Thousand-Armed Kannon: lifelike Kamakura figures carved in cypress.
At Kurama-dera above Kyoto stands Japan's oldest Bishamonten triad, a National Treasure whose central guardian lifts a hand to his brow and gazes toward the capital.
The National Treasure Wind and Thunder Gods at Kyoto's Sanjusangendo are Japan's oldest such sculptures: Kamakura cypress figures with crystal eyes and bold realism.
A 313.6 cm Fukūkenjaku Kannon at Kōryū-ji, Kyoto's oldest temple. Three eyes, eight arms, carved from one block, it survived the 818 fire and stands in the Reihōden.
A ninth-century National Treasure no one is allowed to see: the secret Fudō Myōō hidden in Tō-ji's Mieidō, held by tradition to be Kūkai's own devotional image.
At Hōbodai-in Gantoku-ji in Kyoto's western hills stands an 88-cm Heian bodhisattva in half-lotus, a National Treasure of kaya wood whose identity scholars debate.
Two of the twenty-one statues in Tōji's three-dimensional mandala, the four-faced Bonten and the elephant-riding Taishakuten are ninth-century National Treasures.
At Kōryū-ji in Kyoto sits the Crowned Maitreya, a red-pine bodhisattva ranked as Japan's first National Treasure in sculpture and famed for its faint archaic smile.
Beside Koryu-ji's celebrated National Treasure No.1 sits a quieter second Maitreya, an Asuka camphor figure whose sorrowful face earns the name Weeping Maitreya.
Daigo-ji's National Treasure Yakushi triad: a 177cm tenth-century Medicine Buddha with a gourd jar and seven-Buddha halo, now displayed at the Reihōkan museum.
Carved in 33 days in 1103 for a prince-monk of Ninna-ji, this 11-cm sandalwood Yakushi is the sole surviving work of Ensei and Choen, founders of the Enpa school.