日本のお城アトラス
Every castle has stories to tell.
The people who built them, defended them and lived in them. What you can only see at each castle — in photographs and short stories.
Editor0206CC0Wikimedia CommonsWhere this atlas began
Walk around to the north side, and the white keep turns into a wall of black iron.
On a visit to Fukuyama Castle, we learned that only the north face of its keep is covered in black iron plates. Why only the north? Who built it that way, and against what? Every castle holds more than one story. This atlas carries that discovery to castles across Japan.
Fukuyama Castle
In-depth article
Nanao, Ishikawa
七尾城
A giant mountain castle spread over seven ridges in Noto, whose view so impressed its conqueror, Uesugi Kenshin, that he wrote it was even finer than he had heard.
In-depth article
Marugame, Kagawa
丸亀城
A small original keep, about 15 m tall, is lifted high by tier upon tier of stone walls, walls that collapsed in 2018 and are still being rebuilt today.
In-depth article
Sakai, Fukui
丸岡城
An original castle keep that collapsed with its stone base in an earthquake, then was put back together using more than 70 percent of its old timbers.
In-depth article
Nihonmatsu, Fukushima
二本松城
A medieval mountain stronghold and an Edo-period castle of stone walls sit layered on the very same hill.
In-depth article
Kyoto
二条城
Built in the year the Tokugawa shogunate began, it still has the hall where the shogun announced he would give power back.
In-depth article
Miyagi
仙台城
Inside the 17-meter stone wall of the main enclosure, archaeologists found two older walls, each built and then buried after earthquakes brought it down.
In-depth article
Iga, Mie
伊賀上野城
This castle has had three keeps: Tsutsui Sadatsugu's three-tiered one, Todo Takatora's five-tiered keep toppled by a storm just before completion, and a wooden keep built in the Showa era by a local politician with his own money.
In-depth article
Aizuwakamatsu, Fukushima
会津若松城
The only castle in Japan today where you can see a keep roofed in red tiles.
In-depth article
Saga, Saga
佐賀城
The doors of its gate still carry bullet marks from a civil war fought in 1874.
In-depth article
Takahashi, Okayama
備中松山城
Of the 12 original Edo-period keeps left in Japan, this is the only one that stands on a mountaintop.
In-depth article
Aichi
名古屋城
The keep crowned with golden shachi can't be entered today. Using prewar measured drawings and photographs, the city is preparing to rebuild it in wood.
In-depth article
Karatsu, Saga
名護屋城
For just seven years, daimyo from all over Japan camped around this headland.
12 castles
Only a handful of keeps built before 1868 survived the dismantling of castles in the Meiji era, wars and disasters. Inside, the creaking floors, steep stairs and narrow windows are original.
88 castles
Gates that turn corners, trenches that cut ridges, passages that dead-end. A castle's shape is a set of answers to the question of how to stop an attacker. These castles have in-depth articles that explain their defences.
52 castles
Without a keep, you see the stone walls, earthworks and the layout of the baileys directly — the landscape and the builders' ideas, unobstructed.
91 castles
Builders, defenders, rulers. Approaching a castle through the people on record changes how you see its walls and gates.
80 castles
Walls of rough natural stone, walls of tightly fitted cut blocks. The method and the curve change with the period and the builder.
47 castles
No car needed. These castles are within a 15-minute walk of a station, based on official and other confirmed information.
13 castles
Start with castles that have a keep and are walkable from a station. Easy to read, rewarding even on a short visit.
92 castles
Demolition, fire, earthquakes. Time and again it was local people who saved and rebuilt their castles. These articles tell those stories.
National register
Not only famous castles, but ruins where only stone walls or moats remain, Ryukyu gusuku, Ainu chashi and jin'ya. We publish what we have confirmed, and show the candidates still under review.
