Kamakura

This Kamakura-period portrait of Emperor Go-Toba, said to be painted before his 1221 exile and attributed to Fujiwara no Nobuzane, is held by Minase Jingu in Osaka.

Osaka's Fujita Museum holds a National Treasure scroll illustrating Murasaki Shikibu's 1008 court diary. See its moonlit boating scene and gold leaf pages.

Twelve scrolls over 190 meters long depict Xuanzang's 17-year journey to India. A Kamakura masterpiece once kept secret at Kofukuji, now at Osaka's Fujita Museum.

A herdboy rides his ox home through falling snow in Li Di's Returning Herd in Snow, a Southern Song National Treasure kept at Nara's Yamato Bunkakan museum.

Held by the Osaka Aoyama Historical Literature Museum in Kawanishi, Hyogo, the National Treasure Tosa Nikki is the manuscript copy made by Fujiwara no Tameie in 1236, who transcribed Ki no Tsurayuki's lost autograph 'without altering a single character.' The closest surviving witness to Japan's first kana diary, it preserves the tenth-century spelling and calligraphic forms of Tsurayuki's original — a literary treasure set in Kawanishi, the legendary birthplace of the Seiwa Genji clan.

This 2.97-metre stone pagoda of 1321 at Kitsuki, Oita, was commissioned by a living patron for his own repose. Around a hundred medieval stones share the hillside.

Carved in 1316 and toppled into a shrine pond in the Meiji purge of Buddhist objects, this andesite pagoda was rescued in 1889 and stands at Shoonji, Kunisaki, Oita.

A stone hoto at Higashikataku in Kunisaki, Oita, 3.97 m high. Ki no Nagasada raised it in 1321 as his own memorial; the largest dated Kunisaki-to to survive intact.

The Hiyoshi-to, a late Kamakura tuff pagoda at Mangetsuji in Usuki, rises over four metres: Japan's tallest hokyointo, an Important Cultural Property since 1954.

Sixty-one Buddhas carved into volcanic cliffs in Usuki, Oita, became Japan's first rock-cut National Treasures in 1995. Meet the restored Furuzono Dainichi.

The shrine cabinet of Shakusonji, the Nunobiki Kannon of Komoro, Nagano, made in 1258, stands in the cave of a cliff-side hall reached by a steep mountain path.

A 2.74-meter andesite pagoda at Jōraku-ji in Bessho, Ueda, inscribed 1262. One of only two stone tahōtō ranked as Important Cultural Properties in Japan.

Chuzenji Yakushido in Ueda, Nagano, is a thatched three-bay hall designated in 1936. Its forward altar platform marks it as a late Heian Amida hall plan.

The Nokyodo of Sanbutsuji on Mt. Mitoku, Tottori, a tiny shrine-style hall near Nageiredo, began as the mountain's guardian shrine and may be as old as Nageiredo.

Deer rest among golden bush clover on this Kamakura-period lacquer box kept at Izumo Taisha. Explore its sprinkled-gold artistry, shell inlay, and how to see it.

A late Kamakura armor laced in white silk, with Fudo Myoo stenciled on its breastplate. Owned by Hinomisaki Shrine and famed for its pioneering 1805 restoration.

The Former Jurin-in Treasure House, now in the Tokyo National Museum grounds, is a small log-built storehouse of the early Kamakura period (1185 to 1274).

A National Treasure tachi forged by Bizen Saburo Kunimune in the Kamakura period, handed down in the Owari Tokugawa family and held by Nagoya's Tokugawa Art Museum.

Oda Nobunaga's prized tachi, seized from Azuchi Castle after Honno-ji in 1582. A National Treasure by Kamakura master Nagamitsu, now at Nagoya's Tokugawa Art Museum.

A rare signed tachi by Mitsutada, founder of Bizen's Osafune school, given by Shogun Tsunayoshi to the Owari Tokugawa in 1698. Now a National Treasure in Nagoya.