Important Cultural Property of Shiga

Tucked into a quiet cedar grove in Yasu City, Shiga, the Hiyoshi Shrine Honden is a small but exquisitely preserved late-Kamakura main hall built in the single-bay nagare-zukuri style with hinoki-bark roof, designated an Important Cultural Property in 1944.

The Main Hall of Fudoji Temple stands near the summit of Mount Taijin in the Konan Alps of Otsu City, Shiga Prefecture. Built in the early Muromachi period using dramatic cliff construction (kake-zukuri), this Important Cultural Property clings to a massive granite boulder, with its principal image enshrined within the natural rock cavity behind the hall.

The Former Miyaji Family Residence, relocated to the Omi Fudoki no Oka historical park in Omihachiman, Shiga Prefecture, is a mid-Edo period farmhouse originally built in 1754 in Kunitomo — one of Japan's most famous gun-manufacturing villages. Designated as a national Important Cultural Property in 1968, this thatched-roof dwelling preserves rare archaic features of the Kohoku regional building tradition, including earthen-floor living spaces. Located next to the Azuchi Castle Archaeological Museum, it can be visited alongside Azuchi Castle ruins and other Sengoku-era heritage sites.

Read over the body of Eigen-ji's founder the day after his death in 1367, this ink funeral elegy is an Important Cultural Property at the Shiga Zen temple he built.

An ink manuscript written at Eigen-ji in 1377, recording the Dharma address spoken as the Zen master Jakushitsu Genko was enshrined in the founder's hall.

Three scrolls at Eigen-ji, Shiga, recording the sermon and incense verse for the 33rd memorial of founder Jakushitsu Genko, held on his death anniversary in 1399.

A 1367 ink scroll preserves the verse chanted over incense at founder Jakushitsu Genkō's seventh-day rite, when his disciples resolved to keep Eigenji alive.

Two ink-on-paper scrolls hold a Zen sermon spoken at Eigenji in 1379 for the founder's thirteenth-anniversary memorial. An Important Cultural Property since 1936.

The Gyorekisho records the monk Enchin's 853 to 858 journey through Tang China. The Ishiyama-dera scroll is a Kamakura-period copy, an Important Cultural Property.

Held at Ishiyama-dera near Lake Biwa, this two-scroll ink-on-paper land register from the 1190s lists fields, areas, and dues from the medieval estate system.

Eigenji's founder Jakushitsu Genko died in 1367 after writing this order: return the land, scatter, leave nothing behind. His monks refused, and the temple stands.

An ink letter by Jakushitsu Genkō, the Zen monk who founded Eigen-ji in 1361. An Important Cultural Property since 1936, kept among the temple's treasures in Shiga.

Three ink-on-paper scrolls show how Jōrakuji in Konan, Shiga rebuilt after the 1360 lightning fire that razed it. These medieval appeals funded the temple's National Treasure main hall and pagoda.

At Onjō-ji survive 592 volumes of a Buddhist canon the shogun Ashikaga Takauji had copied in 1354, praying for Emperor Go-Daigo and the war dead of both sides.

A Heian document at Enryaku-ji, Mount Hiei, tied to the 805 transmission of the bodhisattva precepts from the master Daosui to Saichō, founder of Tendai.

This Important Cultural Property scroll at Renge-ji, Shiga, names Hōjō Nakatoki and the 432 men who died with him at Banba in 1333, as the Kamakura shogunate fell.

At Eigen-ji in Shiga, this scroll holds a poem brushed by Jakushitsu Genko, the Zen monk who founded the temple. A 14th-century Important Cultural Property.

On the day of his death in 1367, the Zen monk Jakushitsu Genko brushed a final verse, now an Important Cultural Property held at the Eigenji temple he founded.

In 1366 the Zen master Jakushitsu Genkō named his disciple 'Ekkei' on pale-blue Chinese wax paper patterned with carp — a rare Important Cultural Property.

At Jōraku-ji in Shiga, a Heian cast-bronze ringed staff sets a pagoda and water vessel in its loop. An Important Cultural Property and stored treasure, rarely shown.