The Building the Family Actually Lived In
Tada Residence Shuoku (多田家住宅主屋, also written Tadake Jūtaku Shuoku, the main house of the Tada Residence) is a two-storey wooden building of 1864 in the Ichiba district of Miemachi, Bungo-Ono City, Oita Prefecture, listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property of Japan on 25 June 2002. It sits immediately east of the reception wing built for the lord of Usuki domain, sharing a wall with it, and it is where the household went about its ordinary business.
The date is not an estimate. A munafuda, the wooden ridge tablet that carpenters inscribed and fixed inside the roof structure at completion, records construction in the first year of the Genji era, 1864. Ridge tablets give building historians something they rarely have for rural houses: a year written by the people who put the frame up, rather than a figure worked backwards from joinery styles.
The main house is a north-south range covering 200 square metres, larger in floor area than the reception wing beside it. Its entrance is tsumairi, opening on the gable end, and it was placed parallel to the reception wing's own entrance. The two ranges meet to form an L in plan, and the angle of that L encloses the garden. A visitor of rank went one way, the family went the other, and both sides looked out on the same ground.
A Difference Built on Purpose
What examiners found worth remarking on was the gap in treatment between the two ranges. The Agency for Cultural Affairs record notes that the main house was given a distinctly lower key than the reception wing, and points to the roof surface as the clearest instance. The reception wing carries a concave sweep at the eaves; the main house was given a convex swell, the profile Japanese carpentry calls mukuri. Concave reads as formal and lifted. Convex reads as settled and domestic.
Entry type carries the same message. The reception wing uses a hirairi approach, entered on the long eaves side, which is the higher-ranking arrangement and allows the ceremonial stepped porch. The main house uses tsumairi, entered on the gable end. Since one team of carpenters raised both ranges in one campaign, none of this is accident. A household that had been granted permission to build a reception wing for its daimyo also had to demonstrate that it knew where its own place ended.
Registration reflects that reading. The main house was listed under the criterion "contributing to the historic landscape of the country," together with the Onari Gate, while the reception wing alone was listed as "a model of design." The main house earns its place through the compound rather than in isolation, which is a fair description of how it was designed to work.
Standing at the Front Lane
The Tada Residence remains a private home occupied by the family. The interior is closed, and there are no visiting hours, no admission charge and no arranged tours. What can be done is done from the lane outside, and the main house rewards that.
The useful exercise is comparison. Take in both roof surfaces at once, the reception wing on the west and the main house on the east, and let the eye run along each eave line. The difference between the two curves is subtle at first and then becomes hard to stop seeing. After that, look for where the two entrances sit: one under the long side, one at the gable end, set parallel so that neither faces the other.
Behind the main house stands the fourth registered structure on the plot, a kura storehouse originally used for rice, raised on a stone plinth with its lower wall in namako plaster, the lattice of white ridges over dark tile that carpenters used against fire and damp. Photography of exteriors from the public road is generally accepted, given the courtesies owed to an occupied house. Miemachi Station on the JR Hōhi Line is about ten minutes away on foot, and the same district holds the former Nagata Clinic of 1927, now a café, and the Asō Residence, a former soy sauce works now used as a community and visitor facility.
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Q&A
- How do we know when Tada Residence Shuoku was built?
- From a munafuda, a ridge tablet inscribed by the carpenters and fixed in the roof structure at completion, which records the first year of the Genji era, 1864. That makes the date documentary rather than inferred from style.
- How does Tada Residence Shuoku differ from the reception wing next to it?
- The main house is entered at the gable end (tsumairi) and its roof surface swells outward, while the reception wing is entered on the long eaves side (hirairi) with a stepped ceremonial porch and a concave roof curve. The distinction was made deliberately to mark rank.
- Can I visit the interior of Tada Residence Shuoku?
- No. The building is part of a private residence occupied by the Tada family. The interior and grounds are closed, and no opening hours or admission arrangements exist. The exterior can be seen from the public road.
- How large is Tada Residence Shuoku?
- It is a two-storey timber building with a tiled roof and a building area of 200 square metres, running north to south. That is larger than the 166 square metres of the adjoining reception wing.
- How do I reach Tada Residence Shuoku?
- The address is 1308-1 Miemachi Ichiba, Bungo-Ono City, Oita Prefecture. Miemachi Station on the JR Hōhi Line between Oita and Kumamoto lies roughly ten minutes away on foot, and National Route 326 passes through the town for drivers.
Basic Information
| Name | Tada Residence Shuoku (多田家住宅主屋) |
|---|---|
| Location | 1308-1 Miemachi Ichiba, Bungo-Ono City, Oita Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structures), registration no. 44-0080; criterion: contributing to the historic landscape of the country |
| Year Designated | Registered 25 June 2002; gazetted 16 July 2002 |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | Two-storey timber frame, tiled roof, building area 200 m² |
| Owner | Private (Tada family) |
| Public Access | Closed to the public; exterior visible from the adjacent public road |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs — Tada Residence Shuoku
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00002867
- Cultural Heritage Online — Tada Residence Shuoku
- https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/115947
- Bungo-Ono City — Registered Cultural Properties
- https://www.bungo-ohno.jp/docs/2015022000714/
- Oita Prefecture — List of Nationally Designated and Registered Cultural Properties (PDF)
- https://www.pref.oita.jp/kyoiku/tmp/bunka/post-101/1.pdf
Last verified: 2026.08.05