Heian

A bokuseki scroll at the Tokyo National Museum: a verse brushed by the Southern Song Zen monk Beijian Jujian in a Suzhou pavilion in 1229, an early tea scroll.

Chinese poems and prose by Fujiwara no Tadamichi, the late-Heian chancellor. Copied in 1183 as war neared Kyoto, this early album is a key witness to his writing.

Preserved at Waseda University Library in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward, this National Treasure is the sole surviving volume of a lost 100-volume Chinese Confucian commentary. A Tang-dynasty handscroll that reached Japan in the Nara period, it bears the personal library seal of Empress Kōmyō. Discover its extraordinary journey, scholarly importance, and how to experience it today.

Held at the Sonkeikaku Bunko in Tokyo, this National Treasure comprises four late-Heian manuscripts of the Ruijū Kokushi—Sugawara no Michizane's 205-volume classified history completed in 892 under Emperor Uda. Covering auspicious omens, earthquakes, and Buddhist rites, they are vital for reconstructing the lost Nihon Kōki and for modern earthquake research.

The Gotoh Museum in Setagaya, Tokyo, preserves the National Treasure 'Six Patriarch Shouldering a Pole,' a thirteenth-century Southern Song ink painting bearing the seal of the painter Chokuō. Rendered in the delicate mōryōga style with washes of pale ink and selective accents of dark ink, the scroll depicts Huineng, the Sixth Patriarch of Chan Buddhism, at the life-changing moment he hears the Diamond Sutra. An inscription by Chan master Enkei Kōmon dates the work with unusual precision. Discover the history, artistic value, and visiting information for this masterpiece.

Held by the Nezu Museum in Tokyo's Minami-Aoyama district, Fishing Village at Sunset (attributed to Muqi) is a National Treasure and one of the supreme achievements of Southern Song ink painting. A scene from the famous Eight Views of the Xiao and Xiang Rivers, it bears the seal of Shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu and is exhibited only rarely, every few years.

Discover the National Treasure 'Silk-Painted Image of the Eleven-Headed Kannon' at Nara National Museum — a 12th-century Heian-period masterpiece on silk. As one of Japan's oldest surviving silk paintings of this form of Kannon, it features an unusually naturalistic three-quarter pose, exquisite cut-gold-leaf (kirikane) decoration, and motifs newly introduced from Song-dynasty China. This guide covers the painting's iconography, history, and how to plan your visit to the museum in Nara Park.

Housed at the Nara National Museum, the Gyūhi Keman are a set of thirteen fan-shaped Buddhist pendant garlands of ox-hide, cut in openwork and painted on both faces with kalavinka and hōsōge arabesques. Originally preserved at Tō-ji Temple in Kyoto, they date to the 11th century and are the oldest surviving leather keman of this form in Japan.

Discover the Lotus Arabesque Maki-e Sutra Box, a National Treasure from the late Heian period housed at Nara National Museum. Crafted in the exceptionally rare lacquered-leather (shippi) technique and adorned with togidashi maki-e, this elegant container once preserved decorated sutras at Jingū-ji in Fukui.

Discover 922 Important Cultural Properties excavated from the Kannon-ji and Shikiji sites in Tokushima, including rare 7th-century Analects wooden tablets and the largest mokkan ever found in Japan. This remarkable collection reveals the inner workings of ancient Japan's provincial government, from bureaucratic correspondence to spiritual rituals. Free admission at Rekishiru Tokushima museum.

Discover the Sankozuka-ken at Nikko Futarasan Shrine, an Important Cultural Property pairing a Heian-period blade with a late-Kamakura bronze hilt shaped like an esoteric Buddhist three-pronged vajra. One of very few such ritual swords surviving with both blade and hilt intact, it embodies the syncretism of Shinto and Buddhism in medieval Nikko, displayed at the Treasure Hall by Lake Chuzenji.

Hidden in a natural stone cavern in Utsunomiya City, Tochigi, the Ōya Magaibutsu is a remarkable group of ten Buddhist images carved directly into the cliff face of Ōya-ji Temple. Featuring a 4-meter Thousand-Armed Kannon and three Buddhist triads, it became the first cultural property in Japan to be designated both a Special Historic Site and an Important Cultural Property.

Standing at the foot of Mount Nijō in Katsuragi City, Nara Prefecture, the Main Hall of Taima-dera—known as Mandala-dō—is a National Treasure of late Heian-period wayō architecture completed in 1161, incorporating an older Nara-period inner sanctuary. It enshrines the Taima Mandala within a National Treasure hexagonal cabinet and is famed for the Princess Chūjō legend and its seasonal flowers.

Beside the Hachiman Hall stands the Kanjin-sho Sutra Storehouse, a log-built (azekura) repository like the nearby Shōsō-in, raised in the early Heian period.

Tsumamuro is a plain monks' dormitory of about 1121 in Hōryūji's West Precinct, a 27-bay hall that housed the monks who served the senior priests next door.

Housed at Kasuga Taisha Shrine in Nara, the Kinji Raden Kenukigata Tachi is a resplendent twelfth-century ceremonial sword designated a National Treasure of Japan. Known as the Golden Sword for its near-pure gold fittings, its gilt lacquer scabbard features a playful cat pursuing sparrows through a bamboo grove, rendered in exquisite mother-of-pearl inlay and colored glass.

The Amida Triad and Attendant Child on Silk, a National Treasure preserved at Hokke-ji in Nara, is a set of three large hanging scrolls painted in the late Heian to early Kamakura period. Its dramatic contrast between the serene, frontal Amida and the animated bodhisattvas and attendant child—richly ornamented with gold pigment and cut-gold leaf—has earned it recognition as one of the finest masterpieces in the history of Japanese painting. It is shown only briefly each autumn in the Jikō-den treasure hall.

Held by Hōryū-ji in Nara, the Important Cultural Property Star Mandala on Silk is a rare Heian-period four-court circular mandala. With Shaka Kinrin at its center surrounded by the Big Dipper, Nine Luminaries, twelve zodiac signs and twenty-eight lunar mansions, it is a cosmic map where Indian, Chinese and even Greek-Babylonian astronomical traditions meet on a single piece of silk.

Woven in Tang-dynasty China in a Persian style, this Hōryū-ji National Treasure silk shows four winged-horse riders turning to shoot lions inside beaded roundels.

A National Treasure: a Southern Song edition of Ouyang Xiu's works, edited by Zhou Bida, once in the medieval Kanazawa Bunko library and nearly complete at Tenri.