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Nijo's History
Nijo Castle, or Katsura Palace at the time, started to be built in 1603 as the only Kyoto residence of Tokugawa Ieyasu, and 23 years later, Ieyasu’s grandson, Iemitsu, added a 5 story tenju, or castle keep, finishing off the palace. This tenju was normally used as extra storage, but in times of conflict, it was a fortified watchtower, doubling as a defensive tower. But when the Tokugawa shogunate fell, the palace was converted into an imperial court after the last Tokugawa shogunate, Tokugawa Yoshinobu, turned it over to the emperor. After a short period of time, the Meiji Restoration saw to the restoration of the power of the emperors, and an end to the shoguns in a ceremony held in the main hall of Ninomaru Palace, one of the three main subsections of Katsura, which was witnessed by all important feudal lords at the time. In 1939, the castle was donated back to the city of Kyoto, where it got its present name of Nijo-jo castle, or just Nijo castle. In 1994, Nijo was listed as a formal World Heritage Site by UNESCO, and in 2005, the Anniversary Gallery was added to the castle, containing famous art and literature, with a mixture of original copies, and replicas. Today, the castle is almost entirely open to the public, providing “arguably the best surviving [example] of castle palace architecture of Japan's feudal era” (Kyoto Travel: Nijo Castle [Nijojo]).
Ninomaru Palace
Nijo Castle is split into three different “sub-sections,” Honmaru, the first and main circle of defense, Ninomaru, which is the secondary level of defense, and finally its gardens that surround it. Honmaru and Ninomaru were surrounded by green space and linked tree walkspace; the trees were mostly cherry blossom trees, representing renewal, impermanence, and the beauty of nature. Ninomaru, or Ninomaru Palace is the only remaining circle of defense today, as Honmaru was burned away.
At the time, Ninomaru was where the shogun resided on his visits to Kyoto and consisted of five individual buildings interconnected through hinoki cypress corridors lined with paintings. This is an example of traditional architecture from Japan called Shoin-Zukuri. When looked upon from above, Ninomaru palace is arranged to look like a staggered diagonal, another example of Japan’s unique traditional architecture. “The palace covers a total floor space of 800 tatami mats and has a total of 33 rooms, all lavishly decorated with landscape paintings produced by a team of artists supervised by the celebrated painter Kano Tanyu” (Cartwright). Today, most of these paintings are replicas, but roughly 900 originals remain; Brightly colored to match the outside of the palace, these paintings were mostly of landscapes or different kinds of birds, such as peacocks and pheasants. Inside the palace, the floors would creak, an intentional feature meant to alert for any intruders, especially ninja intruders. This effect was called Nightingale Floor, or uguisu bari, achieved by placing hundreds of pins below the floorboards.
Each room inside Ninomaru Palace had a specific function, the four reception rooms were for outside visitors, where one's rank determined which room one was permitted to enter. “The differences in status, in rising importance, were: imperial messengers, feudal lords who wished to see a minister of the shogunate, senior feudal lords who wanted to speak with the shogun, and the long-time allies of the shogun” (Cartwright). Other rooms were private residences for the Shogun, and were the furthest from the entrance, and were a part of the Shiro Shagoin building. No one could enter these rooms but the Shogun and his selected female attendants.
Ninomaru Gardens
Although Nijo castle had surrounding gardens and walkways, Ninomaru Palace had gardens of its own. Ninomaru had adjoined gardens on the western side, which were designed by famous and celebrated landscape gardener, Kobori Enshu, in an attempt to impress emperor Go-Mizunoo. There is Chinese influence in many places in Nijo, but you can specifically see it in Ninomaru’s carp ponds, each having a large central island. These islands were directly influenced by Chinese ideology, representing centralized and eternal happiness. The ponds also had smaller islands on their left and right, representing a crane and a turtle, both symbols of good fortune. Within the garden area, there are rock gardens and a three tiered waterfall running into the pond. A second garden ran along the north side of the two palaces, which was the Seiryu-en Garden. This garden was laid out in 1965 CE, and was where the castle’s teahouses resided. Nijo Zaiban samurai resided within Seryu-en, which not only protected the garden, but the whole castle. Stones, trees, and other materials used in the garden were obtained from the Suminokura family, which was very wealthy.
General Structures
Nijo Castle had lots of different structures, specified today as “Important Cultural Property,” due to these constructions representing and containing ancient Japanese history in the form of architecture, literature, traditions, and more. Arguably the most important of these structures are the watchtowers the castle had along its exterior moat. Sadly, only two remain, the Tonan Sumi-Yagura and the Seinan Sumi-Yagura, the other seven were burned away in a fire. Most of the time, these towers served as lookouts, and as a way to show the residents wealth and power with its elegant curves of the cusped gables (kara hafu)”(World heritage Site Nijo-jo Castle), but when outsiders threatened to invade, the towers converted into armories. The next structures are the North and South Dozo, which were primarily massive rice storehouses to save the surplus of rice, which was the primary output cultivated by farmers at the time. These two structures “pair” with one another, meaning that they are on opposite sides of the castle, being very similar in structure and size. Both Dozos have windows to view the inside, so that all can see the wealth of the castle. Just like the watchtowers, the storehouses could double as extra weapon storage when needed. There were also important teahouses, named Waraku-an and Koun-tei, which were surrounded by gardens. These teahouses are considered important culturally because they are where tea ceremonies took place, a ritualistic ceremony of preparing tea.
Gates
Nijo Castle has many gates all around its walls, which are even more examples of the castle’s “important cultural property,” due to their impressive structure and design. The first of these many gates is the main gate, or the Kara-Mon gate. The Kara-Mon gate had Chinese and Buddhist influence, and had gilded brackets and carvings of the auspicious symbols. “The eight auspicious symbols, known as Ashtamangala, are a set of symbols representing good fortune and are used in Buddhism…generally including a conch shell, endless knot, pair of golden fish, lotus, parasol, treasure vase, dharma wheel, and victory banner” (Cartwright). This gate had a curved roof with cypress bark shingles, while its inside had brightly colored carvings of cranes, pines, bamboo, and plum blossoms, which represented the longevity of the castle. On the gate are a pair of Chinese lion statues, which were meant to protect and watch over all who entered through the gate.
Next, the Minami-Mon gate is the southern gate, which was built for the emperor alone, so that he could always have his own entrance. Finally, the Honmaru Nishi Yagura-Mon gate is another defensive oriented gate, meant to protect Honmaru, which was the main castle keep. This gate had an easily collapsable wooden bridge to quickly drop any unwanted invaders from crossing. Another defense tactic of the gate was its copper plated gates, which were meant to defend against firearms. On the inside of the gate were little holes used for fighting back against invaders, where rifles could be poked through.
Gates With Pairs
The next gate of the castle is the Higashi Ote-Mon gate, which was the main gate of the former imperial villa formed when the Tokugawa Shogunate fell. Originally, the Ote-Mon gate was two stories, but it was reduced to a single story structure so that “no one could look down on the Emperor” (Cartwright). The Kita Ote-Mon gate is the Higashi Ote-Mon’s pair, and is the primary connecting route between the deputy and the castle.
The Momoyama-Mon gate defends the Honmaru-Yagura-Mon gate behind it, and pairs with the Naruko-Mon gate. Both of these gates are four legged, and are defensive, meaning that they protect gates behind them, which are of higher importance.
The Minami Nakashikiri-Mon gate is the pair for the Kita Nakashikir-Mon gate, and was meant to Defend the Honmaru Nishi Yagura-Mon gate. Unfortunately, the Nishi Yagura-Mon gate was burned down in a fire.
Nijo castle has so many “paired” gates because they were likely meant to symbolize the idea of balancing nature, like “birth and death,” or they could symbolize “good and evil,” which was a common belief in ancient Japan. Having paired gates also allowed for all around defense, which gave a strategic advantage to Nijo. For example, when one gate was attacked or blocked, there was another exit that was directly across from the infiltrated gate, giving extra security to the castle’s inhabitants.
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