castle walker

Akadate Castle (赤館城 Akadate-jō) is a mountain castle built on a hill in Tanagura, Fukushima. This hill is only 345 metres high, but it was the dividing line between the Kantō and Tōhoku regions, connecting Ibaraki along the Kuji River to the south and Fukushima and Miyagi along the Abukuma...

Obata Castle (小幡城 Obatajō) is a flatland castle (平城 hirajiro) built in Ibaraki Town, south of Mito. Although it is not well known to the general public, it is highly rated by castle enthusiasts who have visited it because of the excellent condition of the remains and its unique and complex...

Ōtaki Castle (大多喜城 Ōtakijō) was a flat mountain castle located in the town of Ōtaki, Isumi, south-eastern Chiba Prefecture. In the Middle Ages, the area was known as Ōtaki. Hence, the name of the castle derived from the locality. In the first half of the 16th century, the Mariyatsu Takeda...

Ōgaki Castle (大垣城 Ōgakijō) was a flatland castle (平城 hirajiro or hirajō) in Ōgaki, western Mino Province (modern-day Gifu Prefecture). It is also known as Kyoroku Castle (巨鹿城 Kyorokujō) or Bi Castle (麇城 Bijō). Castellans of Ōgaki during the Edo period: 1601-15: Ishikawa Yasumichi (石川康通) and...

Sone Castle (曽根城 or 曾根城 Sone-jō) was a castle located in Sone-chō, Ogaki, Gifu Prefecture dating back to the Sengoku Period. It has been designated a historic site by Ogaki City. The castle was a flatland castle built on a bend of the Hiranoi River (平野井川), a tributary of the Ibi River (揖斐川)...

Kitagata Castle (北方城) is a flat castle located in Kitagata Town, Motosu-gun, about five kilometres northwest of central Gifu City. It was designated a Historical Site of Gifu Prefecture. The castle was built and occupied by Iga Taroemon Mitsunari (伊賀太郎衛門光就). The fourth lord of the castle, Iga...

Gifu Castle (岐阜城 Gifu-jō) is a mountain castle built on Kinkazan (金華山, 329 meters above sea level) in the northern part of Gifu City. It was the residence of Oda Nobunaga and was designated a Historical Site of Japan in 2011. The first fortification on Kinkazan was built in 1201 by Nikaidō...

Kanō Castle (加納城 Kanō-jō) was a flatland (平城 hirajirō) castle located in modern-day Gifu City. When people hear Gifu, they first think of Gifu Castle, but it was here in Kanō Castle, where the political centre of Gifu was during the Edo period. Kanō-juku (加納宿) was the fifty-third of the...

Iwakura Castle (岩倉城 Iwakura-jō) was a flat castle (平城 hirajiro) located in Iwakura, north of Nagoya. The Oda clan, which held power in Owari during the Warring States period, was divided into two lines, the Iwakura Oda clan (岩倉織田氏, also known as the Ise no Kami 伊勢守家), which ruled the four...

Gakuden Castle (楽田城 Gakuden-jō) is a flatland castle (平城 hirajiro) located in the eastern part of the Nobi Plain, south of Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture, and most importantly, close to the Kiso Highway (木曽街道). It is located halfway between Inuyama Castle (犬山城) and Komakiyama Castle (小牧山城). Oda...

Mochifune Castle (持舟城 Mochifune-jō) is a flat mountain castle (平山城 hirayamajō) facing the sea in Mochimune, Suruga Ward, Shizuoka City. History: The castle was most likely built by the Imagawa. Sekiguchi Chikanaga (関口親長, the father of Tsukiyama-dono, Ieyasu's wife) was appointed castellan to...

Sagara Castle (相良城 Sagara-jō) is a flatland castle (平城 hirajiro) built along the Hagima River (萩間川) in Sagara, Makinohara, Shizuoka Prefecture. Sagara Manor was located here during the Heian period (794-1185). Around 1112, Kudō Kaneyori (工藤周頼), a descendant of the Fujiwara clan, moved to...

Yamanaka Castle (山中城 Yamanaka-jō) was a yamajiro-style castle built by the Odawara Hōjō clan in Tagata District, Izu Province, in modern-day eastern Mishima, Shizuoka Prefecture. The castle site was designated a National Historic Site in 1988. Yamanaka Castle lies in the Hakone mountains...

Hirayama Castle Site Park (平山城址公園) is a park maintained by the Tōkyō Metropolitan Government in the northern Tama Hills, straddling Hachiōji City and Hino City, Tōkyō. Adjacent to the park is the Tōkyō University of Pharmacy and Human Sciences, the Keiō Training Centre (Keiō Museum of Archives)...

Katakura Castle (片倉城 Katakura-jō) is a Sengoku-era flatland mountain castle (平山城 hirayamajō) located on the tip of a hill overhanging the confluence of the Yudono (湯殿川) and Hyōe (兵衛川) rivers, about 1 kilometre south of Hachiōji. It has steep hills on three sides to the north, east and south, but...

Tsukui Castle (津久井城 Tsukui-jō) was a mountain castle located on Shiroyama (城山), which rises along the Sagami River in western Sagamihara, Kanagawa. It was situated along a highway linking Sagami and Kai provinces along the Sagami River and was an important transport hub, bordering Hachiōji in...

Shōryūji Castle (勝龍寺城 Shōryūji-jō) is located in Nagaokakyo in the south-west of Kyōto, at the confluence of the Obata and Inugawa Rivers in the southwest of the Kyōto Basin, at the crossroads of the Saigoku Highway (西国街道) and Koganawate (久我畷) connecting the city to the west. The name of the...

Yodo Castle (淀城 Yodo-jō) was a Japanese castle located in Yodo, Kuze District, Yamashiro Province (now Yodo Honmachi, Fushimi-ku, Kyōto). Today, only the stone walls and part of the moat of the main castle remain. During the Edo period, the castle was occupied by the Matsudaira, the Toda, the...

Fushimi Castle (伏見城 Fushimi-jō) is located in the Fushimi district of Kyōto. It is also known as Momoyama Castle (桃山城 Momoyama-jō) or Fushimi-Momoyama Castle. Toyotomi Hideyoshi built the castle as a residence in the Azuchi-Momoyama period. The current structure is a replica constructed in 1964...

Do you know which was the last castle to be built in Japan? The answer is, of course, Sonobe Castle (園部城 Sonobe-jō). It was built in the Meiji Period. And it was neither a military facility of the Meiji army nor a replica, but the main castle of the Sonobe Domain. After Tokugawa Ieyasu...