Kobatake Family Residence Nagayamon Gate

A gatehouse joined to a storehouse

The Kobatake Family Residence Nagayamon Gate (古畑家住宅長屋門, Kobatake-ke Jūtaku Nagayamon) is a single-storey timber gatehouse on a farmstead in Nakahata, Takatsuki, Osaka Prefecture, built in the Taisho era (1912-1925) and entered on the national register as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 8 July 2008. Its building area is 19 square metres.

A Nagayamon is a gate built as part of a longer range of rooms, so that the entrance and a working space share one roof. They are often found on the larger rural properties of the Edo and modern periods. On the Kobatake farmstead, the gate stands southeast of the main house, facing the road that runs along the eastern edge of the property.

The roof is laid with Sangawara-buki pantiles. At the south end it closes in a hipped-and-gabled Irimoya-zukuri form. At the north end it does not close at all: the roof runs straight into the wall of East Storehouse No. 2, and the two buildings meet without a gap.

Why it was registered

The Kobatake Family Residence Nagayamon Gate was registered, as number 27-0492, for its contribution to the historic landscape. The Agency for Cultural Affairs singles out the way it combines with the storehouses lined up along the road to give the property a weighty, formal front.

On its own, 19 square metres is a modest building. What earned the registration is the frontage it helps to make: gate, East Storehouse No. 2 and East Storehouse No. 1 in one unbroken line along the lane. Each of the eight buildings on the site holds its own registration, but this one makes most sense read together with the storehouses beside it.

What to look for

The gateway is set toward the north end. It is closed by a pair of hinged board doors, with a Kugurido, a small wicket door, cut beside them. The big doors opened for carts and bulky loads; the wicket let people come and go while the main doors stayed shut.

Compare the two ends. The south end finishes as a building in its own right, with a proper irimoya roof. The north end is treated as part of a wall, handing the roofline over to the storehouse next door. Stand across the lane and the eye runs from gate to storehouse without a break, and that northern junction is the reason.

The southern bay of the range is a single boarded room, recorded by the Agency as the otokoshu-beya, the room for the household's hired men. Gateway and quarters sit under one roof, with somewhere for people to be right beside the entrance.

Visiting

The Kobatake Family Residence Nagayamon Gate is one of the few buildings on the farmstead that can be seen from public ground. It faces the road along the eastern edge of the property, and from there you can make out the board doors and wicket, the irimoya roof at the south end, and the junction with East Storehouse No. 2 at the north.

Beyond the gate is a private home. Do not go through, even if the doors are open. The lane is the village's everyday road, so pick a spot where you are not in the way, and keep any photographs to the outside of the building.