Jcastle.info

Guide to Japanese Castles

Osaka Castle

大阪城

donjon
Picture Donated by Adam
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Alternate Name Kin-jo
Founder Toyotomi Hideyoshi
Year 1583
Reconstructed 1931 (concrete)
Type Flatland
Structure 5 levels, 8 stories
Condition Reconstructed
Admin's Rating ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
Historical Site Special Historic Site
Historical Value Top 100 Castles, Important Cultural Properties
Historical Artifacts Important Cultural Properties:
Sengan Yagura, Inui Yagura, Kinmeisui Ido Yakata, Rokuban Yagura, Ichiban yagura, Enshogura, Kanagura, Tamon Yagura, Otemon, Sakura mon, hei
Location Osaka
Map Google Map
Access JR Osakajo Koen Station
Website Osaka Castle
Visited December 1997
Notes I wish I had spent more time and taken more pictures here. I'll stop again one of these days when I'm in the area.
History

Toyotomi Hideyoshi built Osaka-jo in 1583. Hideyoshi, being the great battle expert he was, designed the most formidable castle ever built in Japan. One large moat surrounded the whole castle with only two ways across it. One of those was a small bridge that could be easily defended or even destroyed if necessary. The inner grounds which contained the large donjon were actually built 3 levels above the water level of the moat. Any attacker would have to scale three high stone walls and climb over 3 sets of turrets to get to the inner grounds.

Of course no castle is invincible and in 1615 it fell to the Tokugawa forces. Hideyoshi's heir, Hideyori, committed suiced before being captured. In 1620 Tokugawa completely renovated the entire castle and built a new donjon making the whole castle even bigger and grander than Hideyoshi's original. In 1665 the donjon was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. It was never rebuilt.

Photo Tags

Viewer Comments

(10) | Post Comment
  • John    June 19, 2010 at 07:24 AM
    Oh, and I suppose it would be too costly and to "damaging" redo the keeps again, only this time in wood, plaster and stone- what they were built with in the first place. Oh well, one of the great things about the human imagination is that any thing can happen inside the wastlands that are our minds.
  • Admin    April 04, 2010 at 10:27 AM
    In the post-war Japan when they rebuilt a lot of these they were, unfortunately, not so concerned about things like that. They just slapped up something that looked more or less like a castle as cheaply as possible. Then filled it with museum goods to try and raise interest in the area and in history. These days they are trying much harder to recreate anything in a more accurate methods . The new castle palaces and reconstruction that have gone up recently are well done. There are plans in discussion to rebuild the donjon at Nagoya and Matsumae using traditional methods and materials too. However, just because a castle is a poor concrete reconstruction don't dismiss the historical value of the site. Osaka, Nagoya, Fukuyama and many places with poor concrete donjon also have many original gates, watchtowers or other structures that are important historical artifacts.
  • John    April 03, 2010 at 10:47 AM
    I repeat, why do they always have to use concrete to reconstruct them?
  • Anonymous    December 21, 2009 at 12:42 PM
    I don't think anyone's dumb enough to jump off the railing.
  • Webmaster    October 24, 2009 at 01:22 PM
    Julian, I think it's just a net to prevent people from dropping stuff on others below or maybe from jumping over the railing.
  • Julian (from Canada)    October 23, 2009 at 09:49 AM
    Is it a noren that hangs from the top of the castle? I didn't really notice it when I was there (many years ago) but I've been wondering what that is when I've seen pictures of it since then.
  • Mikey K    April 15, 2009 at 02:47 AM
    Hi, my name is Mikey and I was wondering if any of you have any posters of this castle to add to my collection of jcastle posters. Email me at koenigm@doversherborn.org
  • Webmaster    April 01, 2008 at 02:13 AM
    Here's a much better map in English http://www.osakacastle.net/english/park/map.pdf
  • Anonymous    April 01, 2008 at 02:11 AM
    Try these sites. This map in Japanese is very good: http://www.osakacastle.net/access/map.pdf Here's one in English but is a bit hard to read: http://www.osakacastle.net/castle_en/kokuin/tokinoko.htm#map
  • Anonymous    March 31, 2008 at 05:19 AM
    can't you guys put an easier map cause i need it for a Japan scrapbook project