Kamakura

A National Treasure at Jiko-ji, Saitama: thirty-three gilded Kamakura scrolls of the Lotus Sutra, one of Japan's three finest sets of decorated sutras.

The Thirteen-Story Stone Pagoda at Kunitsu Shrine in Tsu City, Mie Prefecture, is a nationally designated Important Cultural Property from the late Kamakura period. Carved from locally quarried Ōbora tuff with four Buddha reliefs, this elegant stone tower stands in a tranquil mountain village alongside an 800-year-old zelkova tree.

Discover the Saihō Shinan Shō, a National Treasure manuscript handwritten by Shinran at age 84, preserving the teachings of his master Hōnen. Housed at Senjuji Temple in Tsu, Mie Prefecture, this 13th-century Buddhist treasure offers a rare window into the origins of Pure Land Buddhism in Japan.

Three booklets of Japanese hymns by Shinran, founder of Pure Land Buddhism, partly in his own hand. Kept at Senju-ji in Mie and named a National Treasure in 1953.

Housed at Sairaiji Temple in Tsu City, Mie Prefecture, the Block-Printed Tendai Sandaibu Hokke Soki is a set of seventeen Kamakura-period woodblock-printed booklets preserving the great Tang-dynasty commentary on the Lotus Sutra by the Tiantai patriarch Zhanran (Myoraku Daishi). Designated an Important Cultural Property in 1936, this article explores its scholarly significance, the temple's storied history, and what to see in the surrounding area of Tsu.

An Important Cultural Property in Sakata: the shortest surviving Tales of Ise, with 115 episodes on gampi paper, an older text outside Teika's standard line.

The Uesugi Family Documents, 2,018 papers from the lords of Yonezawa, survive in their original folded, sealed form as Japan's first samurai National Treasure.

Volume five of Gyonen's autograph commentary on the Kegon Kumokusho, written at Todai-ji in 1286. An Important Cultural Property, now kept unseen in Yamagata.

Three Goryeo-dynasty scrolls dated 1309, owned by Uesugi Shrine in Yonezawa and designated an Important Cultural Property. Stolen in 1987, the set remains missing.

A Kamakura-period National Treasure sword signed Sanemitsu, given by Oda Nobunaga to the Tokugawa general Sakai Tadatsugu in 1582, now at the Chido Museum, Yamagata.

Housed at the Kikkawa Museum in Iwakuni, Yamaguchi, this National Treasure tachi was forged in the early Kamakura period by Tamenji of the Ko-Aoe school. Carried by Kikkou Kojiro Tomokane, ancestor of the Kikkawa clan, at the 1200 Battle of Kitsunegasaki against the Kajiwara clan — an event recorded in the Azuma Kagami — the blade survives in remarkably pristine condition together with its original black-lacquered leather-wrapped mounting.

A National Treasure at Amidaji in Hofu, this 1197 cast-iron pagoda was made for Chogen's rebuilding of Todaiji and enshrines a crystal stupa holding a Buddha relic.

A late-Kamakura Important Cultural Property in Kosuge, Yamanashi, this hall preserves rare Heian residential carpentry and shelters a hidden Nyoirin Kannon.

A 13th-century portrait of Bodhidharma in red robes, this Kōgaku-ji scroll bears an inscription by Rankei Dōryū and ranks among Japan's earliest ink paintings.

Discover the Anyoji Thirteen-Story Stone Pagoda, a nationally designated Important Cultural Property from the late Kamakura period, standing within the grounds of Tohozan Anyoji Temple in Ritto City, Shiga Prefecture. This 334 cm granite pagoda features exquisite relief carvings of four Buddhas and elegant eave curvature.

The subsidiary Kasuga Shrine Main Hall within Ikuwa Shrine in Yasu City, Shiga Prefecture, is an Important Cultural Property dating to the late Kamakura period. Built in the nagare-zukuri style with cypress bark roofing, this compact shrine hall preserves older architectural techniques than the adjacent main Ikuwa Shrine hall, making it a rare and valuable example of medieval Japanese sacred architecture.

Built in 1194 through the patronage of Minamoto no Yoritomo, the Tahōtō of Ishiyama-dera in Ōtsu is the oldest two-storied pagoda in Japan whose date of construction can be firmly confirmed. Its perfectly balanced form — a square lower story and a circular upper story — has earned it a place among Japan's Three Famous Pagodas, and it is a designated National Treasure. Inside are a seated statue of Dainichi Nyorai by the great sculptor Kaikei and early Kamakura pillar paintings.

Ono Shrine's tower gate in Ritto, Shiga is the oldest surviving romon at any shrine or temple in the prefecture, an early-Kamakura building in late Heian style.

Standing in the grounds of Zenryū-ji and Inshū-ji temples in Moriyama City, Shiga Prefecture, the Kakesho Hōtō is a 3.83-metre stone pagoda carved in the late Kamakura period (1275–1332) and designated an Important Cultural Property of Japan in 1925. With its base, cylindrical body, square roof and tall finial all beautifully preserved, and with striking peacock reliefs carved on the sides of its base, it is consistently ranked among the finest stone hōtō of the Ōmi region. The site also marks the ground where the Kanamori Gassen of 1466—the first ikkō-ikki in Japanese history—took place, making the pagoda both an artistic masterpiece and a silent witness to a pivotal moment in medieval Japanese religion.

Discover the Saimyoji Three-Story Pagoda, a National Treasure in Shiga Prefecture's Koto Sanzan temple complex. This Kamakura-period masterpiece features exquisite cypress-bark roofing and rare polychrome Buddhist murals that have survived over 700 years.