The Oldest House in Tokushima
The Miki Family Residence (三木家住宅, Mikike Jūtaku) is an early Edo period farmhouse at Mitsugi, Koyadaira, Mima City, Tokushima Prefecture, designated an Important Cultural Property of Japan on 3 February 1976. The official register still lists it under its pre-merger address as Koyadaira Village, Mima District, since the village became part of Mima City in 2005.
It stands high on the slopes of Mount Miki, above the upper reaches of the Anabuki River, at the end of a mountain road that climbs roughly six kilometres from the valley floor. From the centre of Mima City the drive takes about forty minutes.
The house measures 22.2 metres along the ridge and 9.3 metres across, dimensions that the local record gives in traditional units as ten and a half ken by a little over four and a half. A yosemune roof, hipped on all four sides, is thatched in miscanthus. Small sheet-metal pent roofs shelter the south, west and north faces; the Mima City description mentions only the front and rear, so the count of sheltered elevations differs between sources. One building is designated, with a single ridge tablet listed alongside it as an attached item.
Dating rests on the building rather than on documents. The ridge tablet decayed past legibility, so the Agency for Cultural Affairs assigned the house to the early Edo period, between 1615 and 1660, on structural and stylistic grounds. Reconstructed on paper, the plan resolves into a regular eight-room grid, the seikei hachimadori, which is unusually ambitious for a mountain farmhouse of that date.
Hemp, the Inbe, and the Enthronement Rite
The Agency's citation is plain about scale and age: larger than any comparable house in Tokushima, better built, and considerably older. Those three points carried the designation. The reason people climb the mountain, though, lies elsewhere.
The Miki family is held to descend from the Awa Inbe, a lineage of ritual specialists attached to the imperial court. Their hereditary duty concerns the Daijōsai, the great thanksgiving rite performed once by each emperor after accession. For that rite the court requires arataé, a coarse cloth woven from hemp, and the household that prepares and delivers it holds the title of miarakando. The Agency describes the family only as descendants of provincial warriors who served as village headmen, using the hedging phrase that marks unverified tradition, and the connection to the Inbe should be read the same way.
Documents survive at the house: forty-five items dating from the Kamakura through the Muromachi periods, designated a cultural property by Tokushima Prefecture. They record the obligation of this district to supply arataé for imperial enthronements, and one bears on the Daijōsai of Emperor Kameyama in 1260.
The duty is current, not historical. The twenty-eighth-generation head of the house, Miki Nobuo, carried out the delivery for the Heisei enthronement in 1990 and again for the Reiwa enthronement in 2019, when the arataé was taken to the Imperial Household Agency. The place name of the surrounding district points the same way: Koyadaira belonged until 1973 to Oe District, written with the characters for planting hemp.
The Muromachi and Nanbokuchō records place the Miki among the mountain warriors of Awa, alongside the Ichinomiya of Jinryō and the Sugō of Iya, said to have supported the Southern Court. Regional histories repeat this; contemporary evidence is thin.
Visiting a House Still Lived In
Four centuries on, descendants of the family still occupy and maintain the building. That single fact shapes everything about a visit. There is no ticket office, no fixed opening hour, and no guarantee that anyone will be free when you arrive. Contact the Regional Learning Promotion Division of the Mima City Board of Education before setting out.
A separate annexe beside the house works as the Miki Family Museum, where the equipment used to prepare arataé is displayed together with records of hemp cultivation and photographs of the delivery process. The looms and tools are the reason to make the trip: seeing them is the closest most people will come to understanding what the rite involves.
Thatch is the maintenance problem. Re-roofing a building of this size runs to tens of millions of yen, and while national and prefectural subsidies cover part of the cost, a substantial share falls on the household. Anyone who reaches the site is looking at a structure kept alive by private effort as much as public money.
The road is narrow and winds. Drive it in daylight, allow more time than the map suggests, and check conditions in winter. Route 438 runs up from the Yoshino River valley towards Mount Tsurugi, and the turn to Mitsugi is easy to miss. Autumn brings colour to the surrounding slopes; a large weeping cherry near the house draws visitors in early April.
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Q&A
- Can the Miki Family Residence be visited, and is a reservation needed?
- The house is a private residence still occupied by the family, so it has no set opening hours. Contact the Regional Learning Promotion Division of the Mima City Board of Education in advance. The exterior and the adjoining museum are the main things to see.
- How do I get to the Miki Family Residence, and how long does the drive take?
- By car from the centre of Mima City, allow about forty minutes on mountain roads. The route follows Route 438 up the Anabuki River valley, then climbs roughly six kilometres of narrow road to the Mitsugi district. There is no practical public transport connection.
- What is the arataé associated with the Miki Family Residence?
- Arataé is a coarse hemp cloth prepared for the Daijōsai, the thanksgiving rite each emperor performs once after accession. The Miki household holds the hereditary role of miarakando, the family that weaves the cloth and delivers it directly to the court. The most recent delivery was made in 2019.
- When was the Miki Family Residence built, and how was the date established?
- The Agency for Cultural Affairs places construction between 1615 and 1660. The ridge tablet that would normally carry the date had decayed beyond reading, so the estimate rests on structural features and building style. This makes it the oldest surviving farmhouse in Tokushima Prefecture.
- What is displayed at the museum beside the Miki Family Residence?
- The annexe holds the looms and implements used to produce arataé, records of the hemp cultivation that supplied the raw material, and material on the Awa Inbe lineage. Forty-five medieval documents held by the family are designated a prefectural cultural property.
Basic Information
| Name | Miki Family Residence (三木家住宅), registered as Koyadaira Village, Mima District, Tokushima |
|---|---|
| Location | 143 Mitsugi, Koyadaira, Mima City, Tokushima Prefecture |
| Designation | Important Cultural Property (Structure), designation no. 01988; one ridge tablet included as an attachment |
| Year Designated | 3 February 1976 |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | 22.2 m along the ridge, 9.3 m across; hipped roof, thatched, with sheet-metal pent roofs on three sides |
| Owner | Private (Miki family) |
| Public Access | Occupied residence; advance contact with the Mima City Board of Education required |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs: Mikike Jūtaku
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/102/3270
- Cultural Heritage Online: Mikike Jūtaku
- https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/124277
- Mima City Tourism Site: Miki Family Residence, Important Cultural Property
- https://www.city.mima.lg.jp/kanko/map/list/4046.html
- Mima City Tourism Site: Miki Family Residence overview and documents
- https://www.city.mima.lg.jp/kanko/map/list/11495.html
- Mima Tourism Bureau: Miki Family Residence and the arataé
- https://mimakankou.or.jp/event/mikikejutaku/
- Tokushima Prefecture Tourism Site Awanavi: Miki Family Residence
- https://www.awanavi.jp/archives/spot/2834
Last verified: 2026.08.23