Himeji Castle - Design Details

Design Details

Himeji Castle is the largest castle in Japan. It serves as an excellent example of prototypical Japanese castle architecture, containing many of the defensive and architectural features associated with Japanese castles. The curved walls of Himeji Castle are sometimes said to resemble giant fans (扇子, sensu?), but the principal materials used in the structures are stone and wood. Feudal family crests (紋, mon?) are installed throughout the architecture of the building, signifying the various lords that inhabited the castle throughout its history.

The Himeji Castle complex is located in the center of Himeji, Hyōgo on top of a hill called Himeyama, which is 45.6 m (150 ft) above sea level. The castle complex comprises a network of 83 buildings such as storehouses, gates, corridors, and turrets (楼, yagura?). Of these 83 buildings, 74 are designated as Important Cultural Assets: 11 corridors, 16 turrets, 15 gates, and 32 earthen walls. The highest walls in the castle complex have a height of 26 m (85 ft). Joining the castle complex is Koko-en Garden (好古園, Kōkoen?), a Japanese garden created in 1992 to commemorate Himeji city's 100th anniversary.

From east to west, the Himeji Castle complex has a length of 950 to 1,600 m (3,117 to 5,249 ft), and from north to south, it has a length of 900 to 1,700 m (2,953 to 5,577 ft). The castle complex has a circumference of 4,200 m (2.53 mi). It covers an area of 233 hectares (2,330,000 m2 or 576 acres), making it roughly 50 times as large as the Tokyo Dome or 60 times as large as Koshien Stadium.

The castle keep (天守閣, tenshukaku?) at the center of the complex is 46.4 m (152 ft) high, standing 92 m (302 ft) above sea level. Together with the keep, three smaller subsidiary towers (小天守, kotenshu?) form a cluster of towers. Externally, the castle keep appears to have five floors, because the second and third floors from the top appear to be a single floor; however, the tower actually has six floors and a basement. The basement of the keep has an area of 385 m2 (4,144 ft2), and the interior of the keep contains special facilities that are not seen in other castles, including lavatories, a drain board, and a kitchen corridor.

The keep has two pillars, with one standing in the east and one standing in the west. The east pillar, which has a base diameter of 97 cm (38 in), was originally a single fir tree, but it has since been mostly replaced. The base of the west pillar is 85 by 95 cm (33 by 37 in), and it is made of Japanese cypress. During the Shōwa Restoration (1956–1964) a Japanese cypress tree with a length of 26.4 m (87 ft) was brought down from the Kiso Mountains and replaced the old pillar. The tree was broken in this process, so another tree was brought down from Mount Kasagata, and the two trees were joined on the third floor.

The first floor of the keep has an area of 554 m2 (5,963 ft2) and is often called the "thousand-mat room" because it has over 330 Tatami mats. The walls of the first floor have weapon racks (武具掛, bugukake?) for holding matchlocks and spears, and at one point, the castle contained as many as 280 guns and 90 spears. The second floor of the keep has an area of roughly 550 m2 (5,920 ft2).

The third floor has an area of 440 m2 (4,736 ft2) and the fourth floor has an area of 240 m2 (2,583 ft2). Both the third and fourth floors have platforms situated at the north and south windows called "stone-throwing platforms" (石打棚, ishiuchidana?), where defenders could observe or throw objects at attackers. They also have small enclosed rooms called "warrior hiding places" (武者隠, mushakakushi?), where defenders could hide themselves and kill attackers by surprise as they entered the keep. The final floor, the sixth floor, has an area of only 115 m2 (1,237 ft2). The sixth floor windows now have iron bars in place, but in the feudal period the panoramic view from the windows was unobstructed.