Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto

Timeline

1. 794 AD

   Founding of Heian-kyo

   Emperor Kanmu moves the capital from Nagaoka-kyo to Heian-kyo and Kyoto begins life as the imperial capital. To-ji is established two years later in 796 as the official temple east of the Rajomon gate.

2. 888 AD

   Founding of Daigo-ji and Ninna-ji

   Shobo founds Daigo-ji and Emperor Uda completes Ninna-ji in 888, establishing two mountain temples in Kyoto's western outskirts with deep ties to the imperial house.

3. 1052

   Founding of Byodoin

   Fujiwara no Yorimichi converts his father Michinaga's Uji villa into a temple. The Phoenix Hall is completed the following year, becoming the supreme Amida-do hall and an embodiment of mappo eschatology.

4. 1206

   Restoration of Kozan-ji

   The priest Myoe restores an older temple at Toganoo and renames it Kozan-ji. The temple preserves the Choju-jinbutsu-giga scrolls, often described as Japan's earliest illustrated story art.

5. 1339

   Founding of Tenryu-ji

   Ashikaga Takauji founds Tenryu-ji to console the soul of Emperor Go-Daigo. Muso Soseki designs the Sogen-chi garden using Arashiyama and Kameyama as borrowed scenery, Japan's first Special Place of Scenic Beauty.

6. 1397

   Kinkaku built, Kitayama culture

   Ashikaga Yoshimitsu builds the three-storey Kinkaku as part of his Kitayama villa. After his death the site is renamed Rokuon-ji, with Muso Soseki as honorary founder, and defines Kitayama culture.

7. 1467

   Onin War burns Kyoto

   The eleven-year Onin War reduces Kyoto to ash, including many listed properties. Toyotomi Hideyoshi and later the Tokugawa rebuild them through the Momoyama and Edo periods.

8. 1483

   Ginkaku built, Higashiyama culture

   Ashikaga Yoshimasa builds the Ginkaku Kannon hall as part of his Higashiyama villa. The adjacent Togudo Dojinsai is regarded as the origin of the four-and-a-half-mat shoin and wabi-sabi aesthetics.

9. 1603

   Nijo Castle built

   Tokugawa Ieyasu builds Nijo Castle as his Kyoto residence in the same year he founds the Edo shogunate. In 1626 Iemitsu rebuilds the Ninomaru Palace for the visit of Emperor Go-Mizunoo.

10. 1633

    Kiyomizu-dera Main Hall rebuilt

    Tokugawa Iemitsu rebuilds the Main Hall of Kiyomizu-dera. The surviving cantilevered hall, built with 139 zelkova pillars and no nails, is designated a National Treasure in 1952.

11. 1867

    Taisei Hokan at Nijo

    Tokugawa Yoshinobu announces the Taisei Hokan (Restoration of Imperial Rule) to assembled daimyo in the Ohiroma of Nijo Castle's Ninomaru Palace, ending the Tokugawa era in Kyoto.

12. 1950

    Kinkaku destroyed by arson

    A novice monk sets fire to Kinkaku-ji and the pavilion burns to the ground, leading to the cancellation of its National Treasure designation. It is rebuilt in 1955 at a cost of about 74 million yen.

13. December 1994

    World Heritage inscription

    At the 18th session of UNESCO World Heritage Committee at Phuket, the 17 properties are inscribed together as Japan's fifth World Heritage Site under criteria (ii) and (iv).

Detailed History

The story of the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto begins with the founding of Heian-kyo in 794 (Enryaku 13), when Emperor Kanmu moved his court from Nagaoka-kyo into a grid-planned city modelled on Tang Chang'an. Of the 17 listed properties, Kamigamo and Shimogamo Shrines predate the move and stood here before the city itself, while To-ji was built in 796 east of the Rajomon gate as the new capital's official temple. In the early ninth century the monks Saicho and Kukai established Enryaku-ji on Mount Hiei and the predecessor of Kozan-ji on Mount Takao, opening the way for esoteric Buddhism. During the Fujiwara regency, Michinaga's son Yorimichi converted his father's Uji villa into a temple in 1052, founding Byodoin whose Phoenix Hall would embody mappo eschatology. Ninna-ji, founded in 888 as Emperor Uda's votive temple, kept close ties with the imperial family, and Daigo-ji was opened in 874 by the priest Shobo as a mountain training centre. In the Kamakura period the priest Myoe restored Kozan-ji in 1206, where the Choju-jinbutsu-giga scrolls would later be preserved. The Muromachi era brought new construction: in 1339 Ashikaga Takauji founded Tenryu-ji in memory of Emperor Go-Daigo, with Muso Soseki laying out its garden using Arashiyama as borrowed scenery; in 1397 Ashikaga Yoshimitsu built the Kitayama villa whose three-storey Kinkaku defined Kitayama culture. Hosokawa Katsumoto founded Ryoan-ji in 1450, and in 1483 Yoshimasa raised the Higashiyama villa with its Ginkaku, shaping Higashiyama culture and wabi-sabi aesthetics. The eleven-year Onin War from 1467 reduced much of Kyoto to ash, but the listed properties were progressively rebuilt under Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the Tokugawa through the Momoyama and early Edo periods. In 1603 Tokugawa Ieyasu built Nijo Castle as his Kyoto residence, and in 1626 his grandson Iemitsu expanded it for Emperor Go-Mizunoo's visit, completing the surviving Ninomaru Palace. In 1633 Iemitsu also rebuilt the Main Hall of Kiyomizu-dera. On 9 November 1867 Tokugawa Yoshinobu announced the Restoration of Imperial Rule in that palace's Ohiroma, ending the Tokugawa era in Kyoto. Late in World War II Kyoto stayed on the atomic-bomb candidate list until Secretary Stimson intervened. On 17 December 1994, at the 18th UNESCO World Heritage Committee in Phuket, the 17 properties became Japan's fifth World Heritage Site.

Cultural Significance

The Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto meet World Heritage criteria (ii) and (iv), recognised for the important interchange of human values they reveal in architectural and garden design between the eighth and seventeenth centuries, and as the most refined material expression of premodern Japanese civilisation. The 17 components contain 38 National Treasure buildings and 160 Important Cultural Properties, the densest concentration of such designations of any World Heritage Site in Japan. The gardens of Kinkaku-ji, Ginkaku-ji, Tenryu-ji, Saiho-ji, Ryoan-ji, Nishi Hongan-ji and Nijo Castle are Special Places of Scenic Beauty, while Daigo-ji's Sanboin garden and the Kinkaku-ji and Ginkaku-ji gardens also hold Special Historic Site status, an exceptional clustering of Japan's highest cultural-property classes. That so much survived the 1467 Onin War, the 1864 Kinmon fires and postwar urban pressures makes these sites an unparalleled lineage for tracing the wayo, zenshu-yo and daibutsu-yo strands of Japanese architecture. The 1950 arson of the Kinkaku, immortalised in Yukio Mishima's novel The Temple of the Golden Pavilion, gave Kyoto worldwide literary visibility, and the city remains inseparable from noh theatre, tea ceremony, ikebana and garden design.

Architectural Details

The 17 components cover nearly every major idiom of Japanese architectural history. Byodoin's Phoenix Hall (1053) is the supreme Amida-do hall, a central chapel flanked by symmetrical wing corridors and a rear tail corridor; bronze phoenixes top the hinoki-bark roof and 52 Cloud-Borne Bodhisattvas line the interior. Kiyomizu-dera's Main Hall (rebuilt 1633) is the kake-zukuri paradigm: 139 zelkova pillars joined to the slope by nuki tie-beams and kusabi wedges without a single nail, supporting a hinoki-bark roof and an outdoor stage about 13 meters above the ground. The Kinkaku (1955 rebuilding) stacks three modes: a shinden-zukuri ground floor, a buke-zukuri middle floor and a Zen Buddhist top floor, with the upper two layers in gold leaf and a bronze phoenix above. The Ginkaku (1489) is a two-storey pavilion combining a shoin-zukuri lower floor and a Zen Buddhist upper floor; the adjacent Togudo Dojinsai is regarded as the prototype four-and-a-half-mat shoin. The hojo garden of Ryoan-ji (late 15th to early 16th century) is the canonical karesansui: roughly 25 by 10 meters of raked white gravel with 15 stones arranged so that from any single vantage one stone is always hidden. Nijo Castle's Ninomaru Palace (1626) reaches the peak of shoin-zukuri with six halls in a zig-zag plan, uguisubari nightingale floors, and about 3,600 panels by Kano Tan'yu's school.