Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall

What is the Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall?

The Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall (末吉家住宅石垣, Sueyoshi-ke Jūtaku Ishigaki) is an early Showa limestone boundary wall, built between 1926 and 1945, at 41 Aza-Minato in Kitadaito Village, Okinawa Prefecture, and it was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property of Japan on July 31, 2007.

Registered under number 47-0051, the Ishigaki encloses the plot of the Sueyoshi Family Residence Main House, registered the same day as 47-0050. The Agency for Cultural Affairs counts it as a single site and classes it among the "other structures" of a residence.

It does not ring the whole property. The Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall runs only along the west and south edges of a roughly rectangular plot, turning once at the southwest corner in an L shape.

Why the Sueyoshi stone wall was registered

The wall was registered as contributing to the historic landscape of the country. The Agency's note closes by saying that it contributes to the historic townscape of the settlement.

The plot is a corner lot on the main road. Anyone walking or driving past sees the wall before they see the house, so on this stretch of road toward West Port, the old loading harbor for phosphate ore, it is the Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall that marks out the homestead.

A wall up to 1 meter thick

The Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall runs 69 meters in total. Across its top it measures between 65 and 100 centimeters, and the Agency describes it as a thick wall body. At its widest, the top is 1 meter across, which makes it less a garden fence than a solid mass of stacked stone. The Agency's record gives no height.

The stone is the island's limestone. The blocks are close to square but irregular, each a little different in size and outline, and the builders fitted them together with skill, using those differences to lock each stone against its neighbors rather than trimming them to even courses.

What to look for at the Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall

The first thing to notice is the varying width of the top, anywhere from 65 to 100 centimeters. Where you can see over the top from the road, compare the broad stretches with the narrow ones.

Then compare the wall with the main house inside it. The house walls are laid in level Nunozumi courses, with horizontal joints running straight across. The Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall, built from irregular blocks, has a different texture altogether, even though the stone is the same. Seen together, the two show that the builders treated house and enclosure differently.

Finally, find the southwest corner, where the west and south runs meet at close to a right angle and the 69 meters of wall come together as a single enclosure holding the corner of the plot.

Visiting the Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall

Because the Sueyoshi Family Residence Stone Wall lines the west and south sides facing the road, its outer face can be seen from the street. The ground inside belongs to a private home and is not open, so please stay outside the plot.

Please do not climb the wall or move any stones. There is no official guidance on photography, but if you take pictures, choose an angle that keeps the household out of frame. Travel to Kitadaito and directions to the port area are covered on the Sueyoshi Family Residence (Kitadaito) page.