Ōsaka castle, like you have never seen!

Article posted on Sunday, July, 10th, 2011 at 10:01 am

This is of course, Ōsaka Castle; it says so in the caption. The large, round, purple-ink stamp says 大阪城観覧記念 (Ōsaka Castle Kanran Kinen), which indicates that it is to commemorate the viewing of the castle. I’ll assume to commemorate the opening of the castle to the public. (Just an assumption though.)

When I first saw this postcard, I was beside myself. Not literally beside myself, as that would involve two of me, and I have no idea what could bring about such a scenario. The reason for my invocation of “beside myself”, is that this was the first time I’d ever seen Ōsaka Castle without a main tower!

The tower was actually completed in 1931 using modern construction techniques. Its external appearance was said to have been influenced by both Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s main tower & that of the Tokugawa’s, which I’m sure they’d both be ecstatic about. Regarding the internal appearance, try to imagine a concrete, 1930′s building.

It was only yesterday that I’d responded to a comment in: Ōsaka’s Megaliths, that I’d never entered Ōsaka’s main tower. When I eventually do hand-over the entrance fee and walk past the famed Kinmeisui Well (Important Cultural Property), I will be picturing this very scene.

Kyōbashi Gomon memories

Article posted on Thursday, May, 26th, 2011 at 10:10 pm

For anyone who knows Ōsaka castle, this old postcard will no-doubt look a little odd. Familiar but definitely different. The scene is the Kyōbashi Guchi, a masugata-style gate located to the Northwest of the castle. Standing in the distance is Ōsaka castle’s freshly-painted, concrete main tower.

The time frame for when this image could possibly have been captured is relatively brief. The tower was unveiled around 1930, and the gleaming gate complex failed to survive the bombing of Ōsaka in 1945. No data was available on the portable toilet at the entrance.

It’s a neat little postcard. The colours are vivid and it offers a great perspective of the castle. I’m a little disappointed with the stamps obscuring the bottom-right corner. Also, the red ink stamp is illegible. All-in-all though, it’s a postcard I was happy to get a hold of.

Related posts: Ōsaka’s Megaliths, A postcard from the edge (of the moat).

The Furisode and Tako stones

Article posted on Saturday, May, 7th, 2011 at 12:43 pm

You may recall from the Ōsaka’s Megaliths post I did a while back, the story of the giant stones of Ōsaka Castle. Well, the subject of the vintage postcard below is the very same thing. In the Megaliths post I included photos of the two largest stones, the Tako (蛸石) & Higo (肥後石) stones. Below we see the Tako stone again plus the third largest, the Furisode stone.

The Furisode stone (振袖石) sits to the left, the street-lamp covering a fraction of its surface. Furisode actually means Kimono sleeve, and that’s exactly what it looks like. Wow! Tako means octopus, and you can see from the shape of the large stone on the right, an octopus… roughly cut into a pentagonal-looking rectangle.

So, next time you find yourself at Ōsaka Castle, see if you can’t track down these stones for yourself.

A postcard from the edge (of the moat)

Article posted on Thursday, March, 31st, 2011 at 3:48 pm

Well, here we are with another vintage postcard. It’s post-dated (19)27, so there’s little mystery surrounding its age. Had it been undated, I could only have guessed that it was no newer than 1945. I think we all know what happened in 1945. For anyone not so sure, most of the buildings shown below were lost in WWII bombing.

The castle is of course Ōsaka castle. The two-story building on the right edge, overlooking a non long-jumpable moat, is the Inui Turret. The thing of real interest to me is the series of buildings to the left. Yes, the buildings that burnt to the ground in WWII.

At the extreme left is the three-story Fushimi Turret. Then a little to its right is the Kyōbashi-Guchi. The Kyōbashi-Guchi being a complex of gates & hall-like turrets. (Teaser: We’ll be seeing more of the Kyōbashi-Guchi in the near future.)

For more information about Kyōbashi-Guchi and/or Ōsaka castle in general, check out Ōsaka’s Megaliths and Postcard – barracks of Osaka Castle.

Postcard – barracks of Osaka Castle

Article posted on Wednesday, February, 23rd, 2011 at 9:00 pm

“The castle of Ōsaka. (The famous place of Ōsaka.)”

Ōsaka castle is most definitely famous. It always has been. The Tokugawa-built Ōsaka castle was famous, so was the Toyotomi castle before that. Going back even further there was the Ishiyama Hongan-ji, which was one of the strongest fortresses Japan had ever seen. The Ishiyama Hongan-ji, a fortress of the Ikkō-ikki warrior monks, was actually under siege for a decade before finally falling to Oda Nobunaga!

The incarnation pictured below is that of the Meiji period (1868-1912). The Emperor had been returned to power and many of the former Samurai castles were being used to house a modern, expanding & most-definitely Western-styled Imperial army. At Ōsaka, the troops were housed in the Nishi-no-maru.

The postcard

The rows of barracks have long since gone but the view isn’t entirely different. The moat & the high stone-walls haven’t changed. Also still remaining are the two turrets sitting atop the corners, the Inui Turret (left) & the Sengan Turret (right). Check out this post I did a while back on the Inui Turret.

I really don’t know enough about postcards/image reproduction of back in the olden days, but it appears to be an artificially coloured photograph. It seems to precise to be a painting and the colour just doesn’t seem right. I wonder if anyone would like to hazard a guess as to its age?

Ōsaka’s Megaliths

Article posted on Saturday, January, 15th, 2011 at 11:09 am

The Tako-ishi, Ōsaka castle's largest stone (by surface area.)

The castle of Ōsaka is an absolute must-visit for anyone coming to Japan. While lacking the obvious elegance of Himeji castle, Ōsaka is mesmerising with its river-wide moats and the gently curved & towering stone foundations. Complementing all of this are nine buildings that at least saw the close of the Edo period (1603 – 1868). To have even as few as that is a rarity.

It’s those walls though, that are the real standouts for me. Of what must be thousands upon thousands of stones, there are eleven that are of particular note due to their epic size. They are Ōsaka’s Kyoseki (巨石), literally giant stones, the smallest of which is estimated to weigh over 40 tons.

All 11 stones were located at one of three entrances, the Sakura Gate, the Kyōbashi Gate or the Ōte Gate. Each of these gates is (or was) a Masugata-style gate (a box-like set-up with one small & one large gate creating a path through two of the box’s four walls.) Why at entrances? That’s were they’ll be seen, of course.

The Higo-ishi, Ōsaka castle

The construction of the Tokugawa citadel was indeed a mammoth task, and for the Daimyo involved, an expensive one. Each Daimyo was expected to supply materials & labour for their allotted section of the castle. The Tokugawa regime was able get their fortress built, and at the same time, drain the finances of any potential adversary. Hmmm…. clever.

Of all the Daimyo it seems it was the Ikeda of Okayama who thought that bigger is better. All but three stones, not those in the Ōte-Mon entrance, were supplied by Ikeda Tadakatsu.

The other big-rock-lugging Daimyo was Katō Tadahiro of Kumamoto, A guy whose mighty big-rock-lugging efforts weren’t enough to keep him in favour with the Tokugawa. He was dispossessed of his domain 12 or so years later.

Below is a table detailing the various facts and figures relating to each stone. You’d probably best take all figures as approximate. Also, check the notes below the table for further clarifications.

(1) At longest point
(2) Unconfirmed
(3) Fell off the back of a truck

Osaka’s Inui Turret

Article posted on Saturday, December, 11th, 2010 at 8:56 am

The Inui Turret of Ōsaka castle is rare bird. Perhaps obscurely to the average punter, its twin & equal-sized levels and its’ L’ shaped footprint puts it in a category all its own. The turret, written 乾櫓 or 戌亥櫓. (It’s all explained in this post: Directions and the Chinese zodiac) is also one of the castle’s oldest buildings, being completed in the years following Tokugawa Ieyasu’s complete rebuild of the former Toyotomi stronghold.

It is said the turret was built from salvaged materials from the Hideyoshi-built main tower. I guess we'll find out for certain after we obtain a time machine to test the veracity of this rumour.

Trash-talking Samurai

Article posted on Wednesday, December, 9th, 2009 at 8:34 am

Image: Japan Times

I came across this interesting story (dated: 20 Nov) on the Japan Times website. It’s about a nonprofit organization called the Osaka Armor Corps and their mission to purge the Osaka castle grounds of every cigarette butt & piece of garbage they can get their katana-like tongs on.

The volunteers have been on the job since 2003 and back in those days they would lug away a truckload of rubbish. Nowadays though, the 20-or-so Samurai garbologists are carting away only a couple of large garbage bags worth.

The man heading the charge is Kazumi Kawai, a part-time high school teacher, who also instructed his troop on how to make the their armour using cardboard strengthened with a special type of paint.

Not only are they doing a great job cleaning up one of Osaka’s great tourist attractions, but the tourists are loving it too, asking members of the Armor Corps to pose in photos.

Folding screen of Hideyoshi’s Osaka Castle

Article posted on Monday, October, 12th, 2009 at 9:55 pm

Folding screen depicting Hideyoshi's Osaka Castle

A friendship agreement now exists between Graz Palace in Austria & Osaka Castle. It all started in 2006 when the magnificent folding screen depicting Osaka castle was discovered decorating the walls of one of the Indian rooms of the Eggenberg Palace. It’s believed the screen was painted in the years prior to Osaka castle’s destruction during the Winter & Summer campaigns by Tokugawa forces in 1614 – 1615.

The screen most probably made it’s way to Europe in the mid to late 1600′s then into the hands of Prince Johann Seyfried von Eggenberg. The eight-part folding screen was dissembled in 1750 and the individual panels were embedded into the walls of the third Indian room of the Eggenberg Palace some years later. The Indian rooms were decorated with treasures brought to Europe by the East-India company.

More information can be found at the The Universal Museum Joanneum website and this Japan Times Article.