Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence

About the Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence

The Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence (井上良尚家住宅, Inoue Yoshinao-ke Jūtaku) is a late Edo-period village headman's estate in Ayazono, Takaishi City, Osaka Prefecture, whose main house, nagayamon gate, storehouse, oil storehouse and tea room were registered as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties on 26 September 2000.

The family's story reaches back to the age of the warring states. According to Takaishi City's historic-sites guide, the Inoue trace their line to Shimizu Chōshichirō, a retainer of the Numa family, which took over Ayai Castle in the mid-sixteenth century under the Matsuura, deputy military governors of Izumi Province. When the castle fell out of use, the family turned to farming. Through the Edo period (1603 to 1868) successive heads took the name Chōzaemon and served as Shōya, the headman of Ichiba village.

The castle site is now occupied by Senshōji, a Pure Land Buddhist temple. The Osaka Cultural Properties Navi places its grounds about 50 meters west of the Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence, so the retainer's descendants ended up running the village from a house almost on the doorstep of their former lord's stronghold.

Five Registered Buildings

All five buildings of the Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence were entered on the register together in its 25th round, on 26 September 2000, as Registered Tangible Cultural Properties numbered 27-0100 to 27-0104. The Agency for Cultural Affairs dates every one of them to the late Edo period (1751 to 1829) and gives the following sizes and criteria:

• Main House: wooden, single-storey, tiled and thatched, 268 square meters; contributes to the historic landscape
• Nagayamon Gate: wooden, single-storey, tiled, 34 square meters; contributes to the historic landscape
• Storehouse: earthen-walled, single-storey, tiled, 43 square meters; difficult to reproduce
• Oil Storehouse: earthen-walled, single-storey, tiled, 42 square meters; difficult to reproduce
• Tea Room: wooden, single-storey, tiled, 41 square meters; a model of design

Takaishi City suggests the estate reached its present shape between the Edo and Meiji periods, but some parts look older. Around the earth-floored Doma of the main house, the beam framing, the timbers of the exposed-joist ceiling known as a Yamato ceiling and the Kabuki crossbeam over the entrance all show an earlier manner. The city describes the group as a large, high-status farmhouse compound that keeps its traditional form well: a main house of many interlocking rooms, a separate formal entrance wing, and a long gatehouse across the front.

Layout of the Estate

The main house of the Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence fills the western half of the lot. The nagayamon gate stands to its south and forms the front of the estate. East of the living quarters, beyond the entrance wing, the tea room continues the line of the house. The storehouse sits west of the main house, midway along the northwest edge of the lot, and the oil storehouse occupies the east corner.

A moat runs along the northeast and southeast sides. The oil storehouse has a loading door on the side facing this water, a detail that suggests goods once came and went by boat.

One corner of the Inoue property holds the Ayai Spring (綾井の清水), a spring said locally to have given the district its name. Takaishi City explains that the village sits on a low terrace and that the spring rises where an old valley filled with sediment, leaving plenty of groundwater close to the surface.

Visiting and Getting There

The Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence is a private home and is not open to visitors. Takaishi City's own guide states that the interior cannot be viewed because the family lives there, and no public opening of any of the five buildings could be found.

What can be seen from outside is the nagayamon gate at the front and the walls and storehouse faces along the street. This is a residential neighborhood, so please stay on the public road and keep noise down.

The nearest station is Takaishi on the Nankai Main Line. The Inoue Yoshinao Family Residence lies southeast of the station, about 500 meters in a straight line, roughly a ten-minute walk. Pairing it with a stop at Senshōji, the old Ayai Castle site, makes the short distance between castle and headman's house easy to grasp.