Читать книгу Tokyo a Cultural Guide - John H. Martin - Страница 9

THE Marunouchi financial district of Tokyo, which was explored in Tour 1, has been described as the one time site of the mansions of the Inner Lords of the Tokugawa shoguns from 1603 to 1868. Just to the north of Marunouchi is the Otemachi district which also held the mansions of the Tokugawa's most trusted daimyo. This section is circumscribed by the main railway tracks on the east (to the north of Tokyo Central Station), by Uchibori-dori (Inner Moat Street) before the former castle walls on the west, by Eitai-dori on the south, and by the modern Shuto (Metropolitan) Expressway on the north. The mansions of the feudal daimyo have long since disappeared from Otemachi, and today Otemachi is the home of the "daimyo" of big business, for here may be found the offices of many banks, insurance agencies, and major commercial corporations.

The district is well served by subway and rail lines since Tokyo Central Station is just to the south of the district while the various Otemachi stations of the Toei Mita Line, the Hibiya Line, the Tozai Line, the Marunouchi Line, and the Hanzomon Line all exit into the area. The Marunouchi subway exit brings one to the first point of interest on this tour: the 1964 eight-story Teishin Building, which houses the Communications Museum on the first four floors of the building. Anyone interested in the various forms of modern communications will enjoy this museum, for the exhibits include matters pertaining to postal, telegraph, telephone, and other forms of telecommunication. Here one will find an extensive display of postage stamps (more than 200,000), thus it comes as no surprise to learn that there is a relationship with the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. The museum is open from 9:00 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. daily except Mondays. The exhibits are only labeled in Japanese, but an English language brochure is available upon request.

Across the street and further east toward the railway right-of-way is the NTT Telecommunications Science Hall. Here the wonders of the modern world of computers can be discovered through displays and the opportunity to use computers. This hall of science has an unusual host to welcome visitors: a mechanical robot.

An unusual location can be found in the midst of this modern area of Tokyo. On leaving the Communications Museum, the east-west street should be taken to the west toward the grounds of the Imperial Palace. Just before Uchibori-dori and the Otebori moat at the former castle grounds, surrounded by the Mitsui Bussan Building, the Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan, and the Sanwa Bank, is a small, open space upon which no modern financial organization has dared to build.

Here is the Hill of Masakado's Head, a shrine at what was once the top of the bay when the Marunouchi and adjoining areas were still under water. The object of veneration worshiped by the early fishermen of Edo at this shrine was Taira-no-Masakado, a headstrong warrior of the 900s. He not only took over eight counties in the Kanto (Tokyo) region, but he set himself up in his domains as the new emperor in defiance of Kyoto's traditional emperor, whose claim to the throne was said to be verified by the divine origin of one of his ancestors. As the old adage would have it, pride comes before a fall, and in 940 Masakado fell in battle. As was the custom of that and later times, the rebel's head was severed and sent to Kyoto as proof of the death of this usurper to royal power. True to his headstrong ways, it is said that Masakado's head flew back to Edo in one night to rejoin its body in its grave. The validity of the story was attested to at the time by the brilliant lightning and pealing thunder which accompanied the head on its flight. As was only proper under the circumstances, a shrine was raised to Masakado's spirit over the site of his grave in order to keep his spirit from raising new troubles.

Centuries later, Tokugawa Ieyasu was not one to take any chances. The location of so troublesome a spirit might even threaten his domains despite the passage of seven hundred years since Masakado was put in his place. No thought could be given to moving the body from its grave since this could rouse the vengeful spirit of this former warrior. Thus Ieyasu let the grave remain undisturbed—as have all the corporate chairmen of the present day. No structure has ever been raised over this very expensive piece of property. Ieyasu, however, took no chances: he had Masakado's shrine which honored his spirit removed to the Kanda Myqjin Shrine not too far to the north where Masakado can still be honored today. There at Kanda Myojin, Masakado's spirit remains. However, the story does not end here, for the Meiji government also foresaw a threat from this wayward spirit, but that tale has to wait to be told until Tour 10.

The small area of the Hill of Masakado's Head is enclosed by traditional Japanese walls on three sides as well as by modern office buildings, but the slightly raised unit with memorial stones to the right at the rear of the plot is still a place of reverence. Offerings of flowers and the burning of incense still occur a millennium after this intrepid warrior's death. Greenery throughout the small plot makes the site a park. Ceramic frogs on either side of the memorial provide a lighter touch to this solemn spot.

While warriors of the distant past still need to be placated, noble statesmen are also not forgotten. In the year 769 Wake-no-Kiyomaro, a member of the Empress Shotoku's court, was sent on a mission. Her senior advisor (and lover), the Buddhist monk Dokyo, had designs on the throne, hoping to succeed his royal mistress as the next emperor. Shotoku sent Kiyomaro, a trusted member of the imperial court, to the Hachiman Shrine in Kyushu to see if the gods favored Dokyo's accession to the throne. Despite dire threats from the monk, Kiyomaro brought back the deity's pronouncement that only those descended from the imperial gods could sit on the throne. Kiyomaro suffered disfigurement at Dokyo's orders for bringing so untoward an answer from the gods. Sent into exile while the monk Dokyo lived, he was returned to imperial favor by the legitimate successor to the empress upon her death.

This diversion into ancient history is relevant, for the large bronze statue which stands in a small plot of greenery at the edge of the Otebori moat to the north celebrates this eighth-century defender of the Imperial House. In 1854 the Emperor Komei raised Kiyomaro quite posthumously to the first rank of the nobility and named him Go-o-myojin as a spirit to be honored. This was a powerless emperor's attempt at a slap at the Tokugawa shogun of his day, for it was his only way of showing his displeasure with those who ruled without consulting him. After Komei's death, his son became Emperor Meiji, who, on succeeding his father, saw his advisors and supporters bring to an end the two and one-half centuries of Tokugawa rule. The new emperor's advisors were not taking any chances as to a threat to the throne from either the living or the dead. Thus on March 18, 1898, the noble and divine status of Kiyomaro was once more confirmed by imperial edict.

Almost ninety years later, in 1940, this bronze image of Kiyomaro was raised at the edge of the Imperial Palace grounds by a later set of concerned advisors to Emperor Hirohito. In the 600s, this eighth-century scholar had saved the throne. In 1940 the militaristic government was taking no chances with any new threat to the throne. As a result, a statue of Kiyomaro was created, and it still stands guard over imperial affairs at the edge of the Otebori moat to the castle grounds.

In Japan, the placement of buildings should always honor the rules for auspicious location of structures lest they be built or oriented in a direction which is not favorable to their successful existence. In the case of Edo and the shogun's castle, this was a particular problem since the castle site did not have the proper geographical orientation, given the rules of Chinese geomancy which were observed in Japan. Shogun Ieyasu, if nothing else, was decisive in matters like this. He decreed that Mount Fuji, to the west of his intended castle, was truly to the north, and thus the castle site was properly oriented. Nonetheless, temples were built in Ueno to the true northeast (from which evil could flow, according to Chinese geomancy), as well as to the true southeast in the Shiba area, as additional protection for the castle.

Back along the Otebori moat to Eitai-dori, a bridge crosses the moat to the Ote-mon gateway and the shogunal castle grounds, the site where Tokyo had its beginnings. The story of Edo Castle begins with Ota Dokan (1432-86), who is credited with founding Edo. The top of the natural hill which overlooked the great bay of Edo and its inlets rose sixty-five feet above the water, providing a natural site for the largely earthen fortifications that Dokan created. Such fortifications had been erected some two centuries before Ota Dokan raised his stronghold here, but they had been of litle consequence. Dokan's fortification did not have too long a life either, for his brutal murder in 1486, instigated by the feudal overlord of the Hojo clan of Odawara, led in time to the disintegration of his fort. By 1590 when Tokugawa Ieyasu chose the site for his headquarters, three small fishing villages and a few scattered farms at the foot of the future castle hill were all that composed the village of Edo. The naturally defensive nature of the hillside was obvious to Shogun Ieyasu when he entered Edo on August 1,1590, and here he determined to build the strongest castle with the most intricate defensive system that Japan had ever seen.

The defensive stronghold that Shogun Ieyasu began in 1590 was not completed for another fifty years. By 1603 he had conquered all the contestants for civil power in Japan, and the work on the castle and its defenses could now be pursued with vigor since the daimyo who were subservient to him were forced to supply labor, materials, and funds to create the castle which would keep them in thralldom. The dimensions of the stronghold beggar description, for they encompassed a ten-mile circle which stretched from the Shimbashi area waterfront in the south to the hills of Kanda to the north. The outer protected area involved 110 entry gates, 30 bridges, an inner and an outer moat, and canals to serve as further barricades. The innermost moat was faced with stone walls sixteen-feet thick to protect the citadel where the shogun and his inner court resided. As has been the case in European cities, the nineteenth century in Tokyo was to see the dismantling of fortified walls as the city expanded and traffic increased. Thus the outer walls and gates of the palace began to be dismantled in 1873.

The castle grounds themselves were always a protected and private area to which the public had no entry. However, in 1968, to celebrate the construction of the new Imperial Palace which replaced the bombed imperial buildings, the inner grounds of the former castle complex were opened to the public as the East Imperial Garden (Kokyo Higashi Gyoen). (The inner walls of the complex divided the fortified hill into four areas called maru.) The East Imperial Garden includes the Hon-maru (the Central Keep), the Ni-no-maru (the Second Keep), and the San-no-maru (the Third Keep). The fourth fortified area consisted of the Nishi-no-maru (the West Keep) which today forms the Imperial Palace grounds and thus this sector is not open to the public.

The Imperial Palace East Garden, the former castle site, is primarily a garden complex today since the various buildings and fortifications of the shogunal castle have long since been destroyed by fires. The Long Sleeves Fire of 1657 was particularly disastrous for the castle, while the last major fire of 1872 wiped out the remaining Tokugawa structures. The East Imperial Garden can be entered through several gates (mori): Ote-mon, Hirakawa-mon, and Kita Hanebashi-mon, and these various gates can be reached from the Otemachi or Takebashi subways stations. This tour begins at the Ote-mon gate since it was the main entrance to the castle in its days of glory, and it provides an example of the type of defensive architecture which was employed in the 1600s. It is difficult today to envision the magnitude of the castle structures, for there were ninety-nine gates to the castle of which thirty-six were in the outer defensive wall which enclosed the 450-acre heart of the shogunate's power. There were within this complex twenty-one large watch towers (yagura), and twenty-eight munitions storehouses (tamori) aside from the residential buildings and ancillary structures.

To enter the castle grounds one crosses the moat before Otemon, one of three such waterways about the castle which varied in size but were generally 230 feet wide and between 4 to 10 feet deep. On entering the Ote-mon gate, the visitor is given a small token. Return it when leaving the compound by any of its gates. (There is no charge for visiting the castle grounds.) The grounds may be entered between 9:00 A.M. and 3:00 P.M. every day but Monday and Friday; the castle grounds are closed from December 25 through January 5. The grounds are closed at 4:00 P.M., at which time all visitors must leave.

The construction of the original Ote-mon gate was the responsibility of Date Masamune, the daimyo of Sendai, and it was in two parts: the first or smaller gate was known as Koraimon, the Korean Gate, while the larger of the two gates lay beyond a narrow courtyard. The inner Ote-mon gate was destroyed during the air raids of the spring of 1945, but it was rebuilt in 1967. Otemon was a masugata gateway. That is, the outer and inner gateways formed a "box." If an enemy was able to storm the outer Ote-mon, he then found himself in a walled, box-like courtyard with a second larger gatehouse before him. Here he was under attack from more than one side since slits in the gatehouse permitted the raining of arrows on the attackers. The chances of survival for attackers were slim. The roof tiles of these gates as well as other buildings often were topped with images of the mythical dolphin which would protect the structure against fire.

Beyond Ote-mon were four maru, keeps or fortresses. At the foot of the hill beyond Ote-mon was Ni-no-maru, the Second Fortress or Keep, while above it was Hon-maru, the Central Keep. San-no-maru, the Third Keep, and the Kita-no-maru, the North Keep, lay below Ni-no-maru. In Tokugawa days, Kanjosho, the main office of shogunal officers of administration and finance were on the right just beyond the gate, a tie with the past which the adjacent Otemachi and Marunouchi financial districts of modern Tokyo still maintain. Today the San-no-maru Shozokan (Museum of Imperial Collections) is on the right as one walks from the entry gateway. This modern, climate-controlled building of two large rooms is used as an exhibition hall for some of the 6,000 treasures of the Imperial Household which were donated in 1989 by the Emperor. Thus a portion of the private artistic holdings of the Imperial family, which are seldom otherwise available for public viewing, may be seen in this modern hall without charge. The National Police Agency's Martial Arts Hall is on the left while further along the Ote (Rest House) on the right has beverages, maps, and souvenirs on sale.

Hon-maru, the innermost sector of the castle, sat on the higher ground within the walls, and thus the progress within the castle grounds calls for an uphill stroll. Walking up the slope, one arrives at the site of Ote Gejo (Dismount Gate), at the point at which daimyo would dismount from their steeds or from their kago, those awkward "cages" in which a nobleman was carried on the shoulders of his retainers. Two walls remain, but the gate and the moat before it no longer exist. Here were two guardhouses to protect the inner castle beyond the Ote Gejo gate. To the right is the 1863 Doshin-bansho guardhouse while on the left is the Hyakunin-bansho. The latter is the "One-Hundred Man Guardhouse," so named from the four platoons of one hundred men each who were drawn from the four major families or branches of the Tokugawa family to stand guard for the protection of the shogun.

To the left, a path leads to Hon-maru, while to the right the path leads to Ni-no-maru, which lies at the foot of Hon-maru. Nino-maru before 1868 was the residence of the retired shogun, and its gardens were originally planned in 1630 by Kobori Enshu, the famed landscape architect of the seventeenth century. Today's garden, of course, is a reconstruction, but it contains all those elements essential to a traditional Japanese garden: a pond, a waterfall, stone lanterns, and a bridge. At the far side of the garden is the early nineteenth century Suwa-no-chaya tea ceremony pavilion, a unit which once stood within the Fukiage Garden of the Imperial Palace.

Ni-no-maru stands beneath the wall that supports Hon-maru, a wall composed of the massive granite stones brought from the Izu Peninsula, sixty miles away, in the early 1600s. At its base is Hakucho-bori, the Moat of Swans, twenty-four swans being a 1953 gift from Germany after the East Imperial Gardens were opened to the public. A path from the Ni-no-maru garden goes back to the Moat of Swans, and to the right of the moat is the Shiomizaka (Tide Viewing Slope), which leads up to Hon-maru. The Slope today offers no view of Tokyo Bay or its inlets (now filled in), for the rise of multistory buildings in the twentieth century have obscured any possible view of tidal waters. In the 1600s, however, the slope was true to its name.

At the top of the slope once stood Ote Naka, the Central Gate leading into Hon-maru together with its guardhouse (O-bansho). The 1657 fire and the later 1872 fire destroyed the grandeur which once topped this hill, and the foundations of the main donjon and the Mount Fuji Viewing Tower are all that remain today. A "Rest House" on the left of the path at the top of the slope site offers a contrast in photographs which are on display: one group shows the castle as it was in 1868; the other offers more recent photographs of the same sites.

Hon-maru contained the residence and other official buildings of the reigning shogun. At the southwest corner of Honmaru is the previously mentioned Fujimi Yagura, one of three such towers which still exist out of the original twenty-one which surmounted the castle walls. It was seriously damaged in the 1657 Long Sleeves Fire, but it was reconstructed two years later. At that time the decision was made not to rebuild the rest of the fortifications of Hon-maru, Ni-no-maru, and San-no-maru. The nation was at peace, and such castles were neither needed nor supportable when faced with the destructive force of modern artillery. Further along the way is Fujimi Tamon (The Mount Fuji Viewing Armory), one of two remaining armories out of the twenty-eight which once existed. Behind this arsenal was a well to supply water to shogunate quarters. The well was almost one hundred feet deep.

There were three main groups of buildings in this innermost complex. Closest to Fujimi Tower in an area now covered by a lawn was a group which contained the Halls for Affairs of State, the shogun's Authence Hall, and Ohiroma (Hall of One Thousand Tatami Mats). It was in this grand hall that on the first and fifteenth of each month the shogun received his feudal lords. It was here also that the Dutch from the trading station of Dejima in Nagasaki were required to make the journey every four years to do obeisance to the shogun, this being largely a political event that required them to bring gifts, and to demonstrate the foolish ways of the Southern Barbarians—the Europeans who were best kept at a distance.

A second group of buildings contained the shogun's private residence. A third group of structures consisted of the innermost quarters which were adjacent to the Central Keep itself. Here were the shogun's sequestered halls for the 500 to 1,000 women of his court, consisting of his wives, his concubines, the lathes-in-waiting, attendants, servants, and cooks.

The pride of the castle was its 5-story, 170-foot donjon that, given its location on the hill, soared 250 feet over Edo. It surveyed not only the bay but the five great highways which converged on Edo from throughout Japan. It had been erected under Tokugawa Hidetada, the second shogun, in 1607 and rebuilt in 1640. All the buildings of the castle were white, save the donjon which was a stark black. Its lead tiles were covered with gold leaf, and golden dolphins surmounted the roof as protection against fires. Despite the protection these dolphins offered, the horrendous Long Sleeves Fire of 1657 destroyed this magnificent tower. The fire started with the burning in an exorcism ceremony of an accursed kimono at a Buddhist temple in shitamachi, a fire which then spread in the teeth of a gale and which turned the city into a roaring inferno. Today nothing but the base of the donjon remains, along with the story that all of the shogun's gold in the vaults beneath the tower melted, a hoard whose whereabouts is still a puzzle and a challenge for those who imagine that it remains within the Hon-maru grounds. The base to the tower can be mounted by means of a slope for a view of the Hon-maru grounds.

A small granary building, Kokumotsugura, is adjacent to the donjon base, and this ceremonial structure was re-erected in the 1990s for a portion of the services concerned with the enthronement of the Emperor Heisei. Other modern buildings are now located down a slope from Hon-maru, and these include the octagonal Toka Music Hall created in 1966 for the then empress' sixtieth birthday. It is in the shape of an imperial chrysanthemum petal, and the building by Kenji Imai shows the influence of Antonio Gaudi in its octagonal roof shaped in the form of a peach flower. As a result, the hall has been nicknamed the Peach Auditorium. Imai used traditional Japanese motifs in the mosaic decorations of the external walls of the structure, a somewhat garish-looking building. Adjacent is the Imperial Music Academy and the unattractive, fireproof Imperial Archives and Mausolea Department Building.

One can leave the castle grounds at this point through the Hirakawa-mon gate by taking the path from the donjon base that runs behind the Archives and Mausolea Building and ultimately to Takebashi Station of the Tozai Subway Line. Alternatively, as this tour does, one can continue on through the Kita-hane-bashimon gate into Kita-no-maru Park. If one wishes to leave the castle grounds at this time, the path to the exit leads down the slope to the Hirakawa-mon gate. This slope is known as the Bairin-zaka (Plum Grove Slope), a slope which it is said was planted with plum trees back in 1478 by Ota Dokan when he established his fortress here. Hirakawa-mon was the main gate to San-no-maru, which disappeared in the 1657 fire. The gate was a masugata "box" gate similar to Ote-mon. It was the gate used by the women of the shogun's residence on the few occasions when they left the castle grounds. Adjacent to it is the smaller Fujo-mon (Unclean Gate), through which those convicted of crimes within the castle or the bodies of the deceased were removed. A pleasant restored wooden bridge provides the exit over the castle moat.

Continuing from the Hon-maru area, the Kita-hane-bashimon (North Drawbridge Gate), leads into Kita-no-maru. In the 1400s Ota Dokan used this area for the training of his troops, and later under the Tokugawa shoguns it became a walled area for the residences of collateral families of the shogun and for some of his highest officials. After the great fire of 1657 the area was kept cleared as a fire break before the castle buildings. After the demise of the shogunate in 1868, the area was taken over by the military for barracks for the soldiers of the Imperial Guard, who were charged with protecting the Imperial Palace. Kita-no-maru became a public park in 1969 in celebration of the sixty-first birthday of the Showa Emperor, Hirohito.

Go down Kinokuni-zaka (Kinokuni Slope) to find on the right the National Archives and the National Museum of Modern Art by architect Yoshiro Taniguchi. The museum is open from 10:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. and until 8:00 P.M. on Fridays; it is closed on Mondays and during the New Year period of December 27 through January 4. Entry fee. The museum, which was founded in 1952 and was relocated here in 1969, exhibits paintings of Western and Japanese artists in changing exhibitions on the first two floors (an extra fee is sometimes charged for these showings). The third and fourth floors exhibit paintings by Japanese artists since 1868, items which change frequently since the collection exceeds three thousand paintings.

The Crafts Gallery of the National Museum of Modern Art is just a five-minute walk away. Continuing along the path which came from the Kinokuni Slope and crossing the highway, after a few minutes' walk one will find the Science Museum to the right while the Crafts Gallery is to the left. The Crafts Gallery is housed in a government-listed building which once served as the administrative headquarters of the Imperial Guard. It is at this site that the unusual revolt by 215 of the emperor's soldiers occurred when they mutinied on August 23,1878. They killed their officers and marched to the Akasaka Palace, where Emperor Meiji was then living, to protest the unfair division of rewards to those who had suppressed the Saigo Takamori revolt in Ueno Park and to demand a raise in pay. Severe punishment was meted out after the mutiny was put down, and, as a result of this insurrection, the military barracks were razed and the divisional headquarters was eventually located here.

This 1910 former military, gothic brick structure, in what has been kindly termed "Nineteenth Century Renaissance" architecture, is one of five remaining Meiji period brick buildings in Tokyo. Exhibits are shown on the second floor of the building, and they encompass all of the various techniques at which Japanese craftsmen have excelled: ceramics, bamboo, lacquer, metal, textiles, and other crafts. The hours for the gallery are the same as for the Modern Art Museum.

The Science and Technology Museum is the other museum in the Kita-no-maru Park, and it is open from 9:30 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. except on Mondays. Entry fee. It is closed from December 29 through January 3. The five-story pentagonally shaped museum is under the jurisdiction of the Japan Science Foundation, and its displays in fourteen sections, especially its working models and space-age exhibits, appeal greatly to children. The labels are primarily in Japanese. The museum covers many aspects of science from agriculture to nuclear science and from earthquakes to electricity—the latter topic being described by a robot who lectures to children about electricity. The museum also has a laboratory, a workroom, and a library.

Beyond the museum complex lies the massive Budokan (The Japan Martial Arts Hall), constructed in 1964 for the Olympics of that year. Reminiscent of the Horyu-ji Dream Hall south of Nara, but on a more massive scale, its octagonal roof is topped with a gold-leafed giboshi, an onion-shaped finial such as is often seen on the top of posts of rail fences at traditional Japanese temples. The building, which can seat 14,000 spectators, is used for sports events, concerts, and other large gatherings—its first use as a concert hall occurred in 1968 when the Beatles came to Japan.

Leave Kita-no-maru Park through the Tayasu-mon gate, a former masugata gate, and on to Yasukuni-dori, slightly to the west of Kudanshita Station of the Toei Shinjuku and Tozai Subway lines. Yasukuni-dori here descends the Kudanzaka hill to the Jimbocho area to the right. At one time this hill was higher and steeper than it now is, but it lost its top half for part of the fill needed to cover the marshy land at its foot as Shogun Ieyasu expanded shitamachi below his castle. The hill received its name of kudan (nine steps) since it was so steep that it had to be cut in 1709 into nine sections for ease of mounting. The slope was further reduced in 1923 with the advent of the motor car. Strange as it may seem, there is a lighthouse, no longer used, at this point. Built in 1871, before much of the land of Tokyo Bay was filled in and before tall buildings were erected, this beacon could be observed by boats in Tokyo Bay. Originally the lighthouse was in the Yasukuni grounds, but it was later moved to the south side of Yasukuni-dori.

Toward the end of the Tokugawa period there were barracks for the military at the top of Kudan hill, but in 1869 it became the site for "A Shrine to which the Spirits of the Dead Are Invited." The shrine was intended to honor those who had died in the battles involved with the Meiji "Imperial Restoration" and the extinguishing of the Tokugawa shogunate. In traditional Japanese custom, the spirits of the dead are enshrined here and can be feasted and entertained, not unlike the Bon ceremonies of the Buddhist faith—a faith, ironically, which the Meiji leaders did not favor. The shrine was run by the army until 1945, thus it became the center of the most rabid nationalism. It still attracts right-wing militarists and nationalists today.

In 1879 the shrine became Yasukuni Jinja (Yasukuni Shrine), "The Shrine of Peace for the Nation," on a more organized basis. Here horse racing took place until 1898. Sumo matches and Noh plays also took place here. In fact, a Noh stage was constructed on the grounds in 1902. In 1882 a military exhibition hall was built, and today it houses exhibits which honor the various wars Japan became involved in after 1868, up to and including the Second World War. While commemorating the dead of the war, as is the purpose of the shrine, the displays which range from the human torpedoes and even a Zero fighter and a steam engine from the "Bridge of the River Kwai" episode often seem to glorify the warlike in the Japanese past rather than succoring of the spirits of the war dead. The labels of the exhibits, in Japanese, still offer the warped militaristic view of Japan's aggressive actions in Asia between 1895 and 1945.

With the war against China in the 1890s and then the Russo-Japanese War of 1905, the shrine became a memorial site to the dead of all Japanese wars since 1853, when the Imperial Restoration began. As a result of the Japanese wars of the 1930s and 40s, there are now 2.5 million spirits that are honored at the shrine. Soldiers heading into battle traditionally parted with the words, "Let us meet at Yasukuni." There their spirits would be worshiped. As indicated above, the shrine has become a gathering place for the more militant of Japanese nationalists who still see Japan's wars of the 1930s and 40s as crusades to free Asia of Western imperialism. As a result, the visits by members of the government to this shrine have caused deep unrest among many victims of past Japanese wars, particularly since even those who were convicted of war crimes, such as General Tojo, are also enshrined here, an action taken surreptitiously by the Japanese government much to the outrage of other nations. Before 1945 the shrine was under military administration, but the American Occupation after 1945 had the shrine revert to non-governmental control.

The grounds are entered under the huge, steel First Torii. The torii's predecessor was melted in 1943 for use in armament production. Beyond it at an intersection of paths is the statue to Oraura Masujiro (1824—69), the first minister of war after the Meiji Restoration. He was in charge of the Meiji forces which defeated the shogunate's supporters who held out in Ueno in 1868; just one year later he was assassinated. This statue in his honor was the first modern bronze statue in Japan when it was unveiled in 1888. Further along the path there is a stone torii and then the bronze Second Torii of 1887, and to its left is a place to wash one's hands before entering the inner shrine quarters. The path is lined with flowering cherry and gingko trees and monuments to military men of the past.

The Divine Gate of twelve pillars, with the imperial chrysanthemum of sixteen petals embossed on its doors, follows, the Shrine Offices being to the left and the Noh Theater to the right. At the end of the path is the haiden, the hall for worship of the spirits of the dead, and beyond that the sacred honden (main hall), where the spirits are enshrined. Between the Noh Theater and the Hall of Worship is the Festivals Section, while the Hall of Arrival is to the right of the honden. Behind the haiden is the Treasury with mementos of Japan's wars, as mentioned above. Further to the right-hand rear of the shrine are the attractive Divine Pond, teahouses, and a sumo ring.

The two major festivals of Yasukuni Shrine occur on April 21-23 and October 17-19. At these times, in the tradition of the past, Noh dances, Bugaku, (court dance and music), Kyogen farces, biwa music, folk music, sumo, kendo and other activities to please the spirits of the dead are offered. These are festive occasions as are all Japanese commemorative functions for the dead. At these times an imperial messenger presents imperial offerings at the shrine and reads the imperial message to the deities enshrined here. Commemorative services are also held each August 15, the day the Second World War ended for Japan. One other period of the year is particularly noted at this shrine, and that is the springtime blossoming of the many ornamental cherry trees on the grounds.

Returning to the large statue of Omura Masujiro and crossing Yasukuni-dori, one can walk down Yasukuni-dori to the street which runs along Chidorigafuchi (Plover Depths), a pond which existed before the castle was built and which was included within the moat structure of the castle grounds. It has its name from the supposed resemblance of this waterway to the wings of a plover in flight. Chidorigafuchi Water Park is lined with about ninety cherry trees, which in 1953 replaced the ones first planted here by Sir Ernest Satow (1843-1929), a British diplomat in the early Meiji period. (The original trees were uprooted in the course of the construction of the Shuto Expressway.)

The name "Water Park" refers not only to the moat but to the fact that one can rent rowboats for a pleasurable period on the waters of the park. Beyond the Fairmont Hotel and just before the Shuto Expressway in a small park on the right is the hexagonal pavilion with a light green roof which has served since 1959 as the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, a sacred spot that commemorates the 90,000 unknown dead of Japan's wars. Under the roof is a symbolic, large stone sarcophagus. Each August 15, the anniversary of the end of the Second World War, the emperor makes his obeisance at this shrine. The shrine remembers all those who died, civilian or military, regardless of their religion (in contrast Yasukuni Shrine is a Shinto shrine), without the opprobrium which is connected with the Yasukuni Shrine for many non-nationalists and for those of other nations.

Continuing along the western side of the Imperial Palace grounds, one passes the handsome British Embassy in the Bancho district. In this sector the hatamoto (the seven thousand guardsmen) drawn from the retainers of the shogunal domains, were stationed in an area which stretched to Ichigaya. Six regiments of these warrior guards lived here, each in its own district, and the districts are still divided into six bancho, or blocks. After 1868 many of the Meiji nobility had their mansions here, and the area is still an upper-class residential district. Opposite the British Embassy, for example, is the modern Bancho House by the American architect Robert Stern, which is a combination office and apartment building.

This tour ends at the police-guarded Hanzomon gate to the Imperial Palace. This place was once home to Hattori Hanzo, the leader of the shogun's spies, those black-clad ninja of tradition who were adept at infiltration, assassination, and acts of derring-do which still fill Japanese cinema and television. The Hanzomon gate has a more pacific reputation in modern times since this is one of the entrances to the Fukiage area of the Imperial Palace private grounds. It was in this area that the Showa Emperor, Hirohito, had his botanical laboratory and rice paddy fields. The emperor was actually carrying on a tradition from the eighteenth century, for here the eighth shogun, Yoshimune (1716-45), had an herb garden and a plantation for plant research.

Just before the gate, on the left, is a small park which runs along the palace moat, and in it is a statue grouping of three nude young male figures. The park is a favored place during lunch time for workers from adjacent office buildings.

The Hanzomon Subway Station lies two short streets to the west of the Hanzomon entrance to the palace, and it can be taken to other connecting lines as one leaves this area.