Nara

A National Treasure at Ryūkō-in on Mount Kōya: a Nara-period Lotus Sutra in oversized characters, annotated for reading by the Heian scholar-monk Myōsan.

Held on Mount Koya, these three handwritten scrolls of the core esoteric sutras carry rare Heian reading marks prized as evidence for the history of Japanese.

A bronze five-pronged vajra bell at Shochi-in on Koyasan, made in Tang China and designated in 1928. An esoteric Buddhist implement, paired with a vajra in ritual.

A Nara-period National Treasure at Sanboin, Mount Koya: eighteen hand-copied scrolls of the scripture behind bodhisattva Fukukenjaku Kannon and his famous statues.

A Nara-period scroll copied in 743 under Empress Kōmyō's patronage, preserving volume nine of an early Perfection of Wisdom sutra. Held at Ryūkō-in on Mt. Kōya.

A sandalwood shrine only 23 cm tall, carved in Tang China with twenty-five tiny deities and tied by tradition to the monk Kukai. A National Treasure on Mount Koya.

In 1987 a ruined eighth-century Kannon emerged from inside Dōjō-ji's secret statue. Faceless yet ancient, this wood-core figure may date to the temple's founding.

Dōjō-ji's North-Facing Kannon, shown once every 33 years, is a sheath carved in the Nanbokuchō era to enclose and protect an eighth-century image within.

A National Treasure of Japan, the Wang Bo Collection Volume 28 is the world's oldest surviving manuscript of poetry by Tang-dynasty prodigy Wang Bo (649-676). Brought to Japan via the Kentōshi missions and once preserved at Kōfuku-ji Temple in Nara, this remarkable scroll preserves verses lost in China for over a thousand years.