Hikone Castle, one of the twelve original castles in Japan and one of only five that are national treasures.
If you’ve ever traveled around Japan you know that they love their castles. Almost every old castle town has either rebuilt their castles, preserved the grounds as a park, or, in rare cases, preserved their castle through the centuries. In fact, as I mentioned when I wrote about Matsumoto Castle (you can find that article here), there are only twelve original castles left in all of Japan. Today, we will talk about one of the finest (in my opinion) examples of these original castles. A castle second only to the majestic Himeji Castle in size and scope – Hikone.
The keep and inner bailey of Hikone Castle.
Hikone Castle was built over a period of about 20 years by Ii Naokatsu, Daimyo of the newly formed Hikone domain. Naokatsu’s father, Ii Naomasa was one of Tokugawa Ieyasu’s top generals and confidants, but he was wounded at the battle of Sekigahara – the final battle of the Sengoku (Waring States) Period. After he passed, Naokatsu became the head of the clan and began construction of Hikone Castle. Meanwhile, the newly established Tokugawa Shogunate passed laws limiting the Daimyos to one Caslte keep and a hand-full of small border forts. In many areas of Japan, this led to a lot of Sengoku castles and fortifications being abandoned or destroyed as the Daimyo all worked to improve their primary castles or to build new, grand peacetime palaces. The Ii clan, however, took all of the best parts of the neighboring, obsolete fortifications and incorporated them into Hikone Castle. The donjon, or keep of the castle was built in 1575 for nearby Otsu Castle, for example, and moved to Hikone when Otsu was decommissioned. Whatever useful gates and structures from the defunct castles couldn’t be used for Hikone were sold or given to the local temples. Many of the old temple gates in modern day Shiga Prefecture are actually left over from these old castles. In 1622, Hikone was completed by Naokatsu’s younger brother, Naotaka.
Hikonyan, Hikone’s official mascot and another character stand in front of the rebuilt palace.
The white cat Hikonyan is based on a legend where Ii Naotaka, third Daimyo of Hikone, was caught in a sudden thunderstorm and had taken refuge under a tree. As he stood waiting for the rain to stop, a white cat beckoned him into a nearby temple. Naotaka followed the cat into the temple building only moments before lightning struck and destroyed the tree where he was standing. Nyan is also the Japanese version of “meow”.
And so Hikone has continued to exist. Fifteen Ii clan Daimyo ruled from Hikone Castle in peace throughout the 271 odd years of the Edo period, ever faithful to their Tokugawa masters. But all things must come to an end. In 1871 Ii Naonori stepped down as the last lord of Hikone and the castle was passed to the new Meiji Government, who promptly scheduled it to be dismantled along with all of the other castles. And that would have been it, except that the Emperor Meiji was traveling through the area just before deconstruction was supposed to start and commented that the castle was beautiful and it would be a shame to tear it down. With the Emperor’s support, all work to dismantle Hikone Castle and it was instead preserved. Today, the castle is still preserved largely as it was in the 1870s. The keep is all original and a national treasure. Many of the walls, gates, and moats are still all original with only a few of the outer walls being newer reconstructions. Visitors can walk the Daimyo’s garden and visit the old tea house. The palace has been recently rebuilt, but it serves as a large, modern, and well curated museum. In fact, almost every structure is open to the public with museum displays and exhibitions. There is even a push to have Hikone Castle listed along side Himeji as a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Hikone Castle keep as seen from the inner garden. The thatched tea house is also original and is where the Ii clan Daimyo and officials would have relaxed.
Bottom line is, Hikone Castle is an amazing place to visit. When I visited, it took twice as long to go through as I had originally planned and I still couldn’t see everything. There are English placards, books, brochures, and displays throughout the castle complex making it very easy for non-Japanese speakers to understand everything. It is also only 45 minutes by train from Kyoto, making it a great day trip if for those visiting the ancient capital. Hikone Castle is one of the best castles in Japan and if you want to see what castles were really like in the feudal Japan, this is the place to go.