Piles of tiles

     

Am I the only one who finds this surprising? There are broken roof tiles laying around at almost every castle I visit. Are castles the dumping ground for Karate practitioners who punch & head-butt tiles or did they once belong to the castle’s original buildings?

Perhaps I’m placing too much value on what is essentially debris, but these are things I see on display, in glass cabinets. Also, in some parts of Japan, finds like these would make it to the front page of the newspaper. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this whether you’ve visited castles or not.

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  • http://www.twitter.com/screamo_ranger Jeff

    That’s really interesting. When you said that if they were from the original construction of Fukuoka castle that they would be on display in museums, in my opinion a broken roof file isn’t of much significance, especially if they are in abundance on the castle grounds in varying degrees of breakage and have moss growth on them. They sort of look like rocks, or tiles you could find elsewhere perhaps. That and since Fukuoka castle is a decreed historic site, being caught with that might impose a slap on the wrist or some hefty fine as opposed to being kicked out/banned out of the country. haha xD

  • http://www.curiousjapan.blogspot.com brian fitzmaurice

    I’ve been to a lot of castles in Japan and have seen the old tiles and pieces of tile displayed in cases as important artifacts too, but never noticed pieces laying around the grounds. Seems strange that no one has picked them up. Restoration work always seems to be a very through process with the scaffolding completely covered with white plastic. Can’t imagine they’d miss any original pieces. Wonder if those bits you’ve seen have fallen off in earthquakes… Hmmm…Could make a great E-Bay store, but the government would probably frown on it. :-)
    You must have sharp eyes, Dan. I’m definitely looking around the grounds more carefully next time. Thanks for the interesting post.

  • admin

    Thanks for your comments guys, it’s great to see some first-time commenters.

    I don’t know if I have sharp eyes or not, but I regularly see roof tile fragments. Hmmm….. e-bay

  • RJ

    There were big piles of roofing tiles below the ni-no-maru at Saiki castle (hard to get to unless you know where you’re going). I was tempted to grab one, but decided to leave it. Someone told me at one point the way to tell the difference between “new” and “old” roofing tiles, but I forgot if those ones were of the old or new variety. I think at the time I wasn’t really sure.

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