Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya Main House (Former Medoruma Family Residence Main House)

What Is Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya Main House?

Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya Main House (Former Medoruma Family Residence Main House) is a single-story timber Okinawan farmhouse built in 1890, now standing at Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya in Kamiseido, Chatan Town, Okinawa Prefecture, and it was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on February 23, 2012.

In Japanese it is 北谷町うちなぁ家主屋（旧目取真家住宅主屋）, read Chatan-chō Uchinā-ya shuoku (kyū Medoruma-ke jūtaku shuoku). The surname 目取真 is the Okinawan name Medoruma. The house first stood in Yoshihara (Jagaru), elsewhere in Chatan, and was moved to its present site in 2005. The Agency for Cultural Affairs records it as a single-story timber building with a tiled roof and a building area of 104 square meters, owned by Chatan Town.

Why the Medoruma Main House Was Registered

Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya Main House was registered under the criterion of being a model of form. The Agency calls it an example of the traditional Okinawan house and points to two things: the roof and the floor plan.

The roof is hipped (Yosemune-zukuri) and laid with interlocking pantiles (Hongawarabuki) in Okinawa's red clay. Along the south and east sides runs an Amahaji, a deep eave carried on its own row of posts. Inside, three front rooms line up from east to west: the ichibanza, the nibanza and the wood-floored sanbanza, with the kitchen at the west end. The ichibanza has a decorative alcove, the nibanza holds the family altar, and a strip of back rooms, the uraza, runs along the north. Three rooms in front and service rooms behind is the pattern Okinawan farmhouses kept for generations.

The date adds a second layer. Under the Ryukyu Kingdom, rank governed the size of a homestead and the number of tatami in each room, and commoners outside Naha could not use roof tiles. The rule was abolished in 1889, so a house raised the next year belongs to the first generation of ordinary homes in Okinawa to carry red tile.

What to Look For at the Medoruma Main House

From the front, the red roof slopes low on all four sides over a line of amahaji posts. The amahaji softened driving rain and hard sun before they reached the rooms, and it doubled as a veranda for sitting and looking out over the yard. At Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya Main House it wraps around the east side as well as the south, which is worth checking from the corner. A shisa lion guards the roof.

Step inside and the purpose of each room becomes clear. The town's leaflet explains that the ichibanza, at the east end, was the formal room: a hanging scroll went in its alcove, and men were entertained there at celebrations. The nibanza next door held the Buddhist altar and ancestral tablets, and it was also where the family slept and ate.

Behind the front rooms, a long, narrow back room called the kucha served as sleeping space for the elderly and the sick, a room for childbirth, and storage for jars of seasonings. The kitchen at the west end was known in Shuri and Naha as the dēju; today the word shimu, meaning "lower," is more common, because the kitchen sits at the lower end of the house.

Moving the Medoruma Main House and Dating It

Chatan Town's website tells the story. In fiscal 1993 the Medoruma family, about to rebuild, offered the town their red-tiled house of 1890, which by then had stood for 104 years and survived the Battle of Okinawa. The Board of Education accepted it, and in 2005 the house was re-erected as Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya Main House.

The sources disagree on two figures. The Agency's database gives the date in its Japanese-era column as Meiji 23, which is 1890, but its Western-calendar column reads 1898. The town's materials say 1890, and this article follows them and the Meiji 23 entry. On size, the Agency records a building area of 104 square meters, while the town's leaflet gives a floor area of about 79.3 square meters.

Visiting the Medoruma Main House

On opening days Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya Main House is free to visit, and you can take off your shoes and step up into the rooms. Old household tools and a sanshin are laid out inside, and the alcove of the ichibanza and the altar of the nibanza can be seen up close. To see how the amahaji turns the corner, walk past the hinpun screen to the southeast corner of the house, where the south and east sides come into view together.

The town gives no official guidance on photography. Opening hours, closing days and directions are covered on the Chatan Town Uchinaa-ya page.