Edo
江戸Browse Japan’s cultural heritage from the Edo period (1603 – 1868). Filter by prefecture, type, and keyword, with concise stories, maps, and travel tips.
Worship and offering halls at Yuga Shrine, Kurashiki, built in 1777 with a curved kara-hafu porch added in 1838. Dense carving marks the front. Registered in 2024.
The main hall of Ryujoin in Tamano, Okayama, built in 1819 on a hillside terrace, has a cusped-gable entrance and gable carvings of lion-dogs and tigers.
Preserved in Okayama Prefecture, this Important Cultural Property is a katana forged in 1674 by the legendary swordsmith Nagasone Kotetsu — one of the two yokozuna of the new sword era. Bearing a refined late-period Hakotora signature, with a 76.3 cm cutting edge and the celebrated juzuba temper line, this masterpiece descends through the Okudaira daimyo family.
The library of the commoners' school at Shizutani: 4,041 books and objects from the Bunko of 1677, an Important Cultural Property at the Okayama Prefectural Museum.
Built in 1687, Ie Udun Baka is the tomb of a Ryukyu royal branch family and a rare securely dated turtleback tomb, an Important Cultural Property since 1999.
Home of a Ryukyuan gentry family on Kume Island, built about 1754 inside limestone walls and fukugi trees. Designated in 1972; visits by advance reservation only.
On a quiet lane in Ishigaki, the Former Miyara Dunchi housed a family that governed a Ryukyu district. It is the only samurai residence with national designation.
The Former Waukei Family Tomb on Ishigaki sets a 17th-century cave burial chamber within walled limestone courts, an early form in Okinawan tomb design.
Founded in 1614 and rebuilt around 1786 after a tsunami, this Ishigaki shrine has carved peonies, demons, lions and dragons rarely seen on shrines elsewhere.
The Sesoko Toteikun on Sesoko Island, Okinawa, a shrine to the Chinese earth god from the late Edo period (1751–1829), is a walled coral-rock enclosure.
Tamaudun on Izena Island, Okinawa, is the 1688 gable-roofed stone tomb of Sho Shoku, father of King Sho En, designated in 2017. Free to visit, near Nakada Port.
Stone village spring of the later Edo period in Kiyuna, Ginowan, with men's and women's basins inside massive early 19th-century walls. Visits by appointment.
The Tuyumya Tombs in Hirara, Miyakojima, are three 18th- and 19th-century stone tombs of the Nakasone chieftain line, with tsunpun screens and notched roof posts.
A 177.5-meter coral-limestone wall in Maja, Kumejima, that once enclosed a Ryukyu district office, with two arched gates; an Important Cultural Property since 1972.
A late Edo house of 102 sq m at Ryukyu Mura in Onna, Okinawa, listed in 2007. Built in Shuri by the Yonabaru family, it has ground-level canopy eaves east and south.
Late-Edo thatched farmhouse in the hills of Hanamaki, Iwate, returned to its straight plan in 1978 when a later stable was removed. Turf ridge, earthen walls.
Mid-18th-century thatched farmhouse in Hanamaki, Iwate, turned into an L-shaped Nanbu magariya when a stable was added in the 1850s. Open free, April to November.
Built in 1728 with a thatched gate of 1720, the Former Kanno Family Residence in Kitakami's Michinoku Folklore Village is Iwate's oldest securely dated farmhouse.
At Denshoen in Tono, the Former Kikuchi Family Residence began as a straight farmhouse and gained its stable wing early, showing how the L-shaped magariya took form.
The Former Hoonokidate Family Residence in Ichinohe, a 29.9-meter thatched farmhouse of about 1862, is closed until September 2030 (planned) for major restoration.