Tonomachi Street Tsuwano Samurai Quarter

 

Koi swimming in small canals along the street are an icon of Tsuwano, a small castle town in the mountains of Shimane.

In the previous post we looked at Tonomachi Street, the main street of the town that is part of an Historic Preservation District.

That post looked at the merchant section of the street, but in this post we will look at the samurai section of the street, closer to the castle.

Fewer of the buildings remain in this section, but plenty of walls and gates remain.

One of the remaining building is the Yorokan, the domaoin school for samurai. Running alonside it is the main canal filled with koi.

It was founded in 1786 by the 8th Lord, and closed in 1872.

Mori Ogai, the famous author born in Tsuwano, studied here.

It used to hold a huge collection of artifacts relating to local history and folklore, as seen above, but has been renovated back to its original condition, as seen below.

While some space was for book learning and lectures, most of the spaces were used for various weapons training.

There are a lot of large storehouses in the immediate vicinity.

One of the first group of buildings inside the samurai quarter, opposite the Catholic church, has been converted into a restaurant, coffe shop and tearooms, and souvenir shop called Saronoki, well worth visiting for its garden.

The previous post in this series on Tsuwano was on the other section of the old street, the merchant quarter.

if you would like to subscribe by email, just leave your email address in the comments below. It will not be published or made public. I post new content almost every day, and send out an email about twice a month with short descriptions and links to the most recent posts.

Tonomachi Street Tsuwano Merchant Quarter

 

Tsuwano, a former castle town in the remote mountains near the Shimane and Yamaguchi border is known as a "Little Kyoto".

Little Kyoto is actually a registered name you can use if you pay the organization the right fees, and I find it quite misleading. What it really means is there are historic attractions in a relatively small area, not that they are pretentious, overcrowded, and overpriced like the real Kyoto.

Tsuwano is also one of the more than 120 areas of Japan that is a Historic Preservation District. Actually the Japanese term is a long-winded title involving "traditional buildings," but I prefer the simplicity of Preservation District.

Tsuwano is also classified as a Japan Heritage site, a fairly recent system that includes sites and practices that they can't get onto UNESCO World Heritage status. Actually, that is a little cynical of me.... a lot of the Japan Heritage sites are quite interesting...

The preservation district in Tsuwano centres on Tonomachi Street, the main street of the old town, and it was in earlier days divided into the samurai section, closer to the castle, and the merchant section. At that time a huge gate separated the two sections. That gate is now relocated to be the gate of Yomeiji Temple.

Worth exploring are the narrow side streets...

In fact a few traditional ryokan are hidden away down side streets...

The main street does have some modern buildings on it, but also a range of traditional businesses...

There are a couple of sake breweries....... incidentally, the final photo of the post is from inside one Sake brewery.

There is a traditional rice shop, well worth visiting for the small ponds crammed full of koi in the rear...second photo of the post

There are some eateries and coffee shops....

My favorite though is a traditional pharmacy filled with weird and wonderful example of Chinese medicine....

The Japan Heritage information centre is also well worth a visit.....

In the next post I will look at the samurai quarter....

I have done quite a few posts on Tsuwano, click here to see some in reverse chronological order....

I have also posted on quite a few Preservation Districts, recent ones being Yanai in Yamaguchi and Yuasa in Wakayama.

The previous post was on the gardens at the Hori Mansion, a little out of town...

if you would like to subscribe by email, just leave your email address in the comments below. It will not be published or made public. I post new content almost every day, and send out an email about twice a month with short descriptions and links to the most recent posts.

The Hori Mansion & Gardens

 

The Hori Family Mansion is located in a narrow valley about 9 kilometers from Tsuwano Castle, and I have always presumed they were high-ranking vassals of that domain.

It turns out they are not connected to the domain at all, in fact the five villages around their property were an enclave directly ruled by the Tokugawa Shogunate and administered from Omori, at Iwami Ginzan.

The Hori operated the copper and silver mines in the area. Following the Meiji Restoration in 1868 they started to buy up copper mines all over western Japan, and the 15th-generation family head Hori Reizo earned the nickname Chugoku Copper King.

It was he who built the sukiya-style, two storey guesthouse here called Rakusanso with its pond garden featured in this post.

It is a National Site of Scenic Beauty, and there are actually three gardens here.

There is a small, karesansui garden along the side of the mainhouse which is older than the big pond garden, but on this visit, I didn't photograph it.

Also, across the road, is another garden with multiple ponds called Warakuen, and I only took one photo of it, the final photo in this post.

The main house was built in 1785 and features a three tatami tearoom pictured in photos 3 and 4 above.

The two-storey Rakanso was built between 1897 and 1900

Viewing the garden from the second floor veranda is particularly nice.

The stroll garden features a couple of small bridges, and 17 stone lanterns plus a tall stone pagoda.

There is a small waterfall built into the hillside that borders the garden.

The koi in the pond, when I visited, were all of a golden-yellow breed.

The island in the pond is considered a Dejima, and not a turtle island or a crane island.

For this interested in traditional architecture, both the Edo-period main house and the Meiji-period Rakanso guest house are well worth exploring.

For those interested in gardens, the three gardens are also well worth a visit though I didn't photograph the older, karesansui garden of the main house, nor really explored the Warakuen garden across the road, and my photos of the Rakanso garden are really not all that good

It is quite difficult to reach the Hori residence and gardens without a car. There are only a couple of buses a day. It would be possible by rental cycle, of which there are many in Tsuwano. The upside is that it will not be crowded.

This visit was almost twenty years ago, and I will definitely be making a return visit as I have a deeper interest in the traditional architecture and gardens now.

I will be sure to visit in the late Autumn when the colours will make the gardens more beautiful and perhaps clearer.

The previous post in this series on the delights of Tsuwano was on the colour and pageantry of the Great Spring Festival at Taikodani Inari Shrine.

if you would like to subscribe by email, just leave your email address in the comments below. It will not be published or made public. I post new content almost every day, and send out an email about twice a month with short descriptions and links to the most recent posts.