What was the purpose of Japanese castles?

Castles in Japan began as fortresses for military defense. They were placed in strategic locations, along trade routes, roads, and rivers. Though castles continued to be built with these considerations, for centuries, fortresses were also built as centres of governance.



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The castle keep, usually three to five stories tall, is known as the tenshukaku(???) or tenshu(??), and may be linked to a number of smaller buildings of two or three stories. Some castles, notably Azuchi, had keeps of as many as seven stories.

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After the end of the feudal age (1868), many castles were destroyed as unwelcome relics of the past or were lost in World War II. Only a dozen original castles, i.e. castles with a main keep that dates from the feudal era (before 1868), survive today.

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Japanese castles sprang up throughout the territory beginning in the Sengoku era between 1477 and 1573. At one point, there is said to have been more than 5,000 hundred castles throughout Japan, and over 100 still stand today. Chief among these is Himeji Castle in Osaka, which was built in 1609.

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As a result, over 3,000 castles were reduced to 170, about 95% of the Japanese castles were ruined. About 260 years later, in 1873, the Meiji government promulgated the law of demolishing the castles to proceed with the westernization in Japan.

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A fire has destroyed all the main structures of Shuri Castle, a Unesco World Heritage site on Japan's southern island of Okinawa.

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From fairytale castles to mighty fortresses, the Dordogne Valley is the proud owner of a stunning cultural heritage and some of the prettiest sites in France.

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Whilst the exact number is not known, experts have estimated that Germany is home to over 20.000 castles. From castles that look like they come straight out of a fairy tale to medieval fortresses with moats, Germany features some of Europe's most impressive castles and palaces.

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Today Germany enjoys a brilliant heritage of Castles, counting around 2,100 castles distributed nationwide.

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Osaka Castle was constructed in 1585 by Toyotomi Hideyoshi. He used it as his base to unify Japan after many years of war. The huge castle took two years to build, with a crew of 20,000 to 30,000 working daily. The stone walls for the main, secondary and tertiary enclosures measure about 12 km in length.

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As feudalism in China had been largely superseded by centralised nation states since the Qin Dynasty from 221 BC, most Chinese castles were not intended as residences of the nobility, but are more properly described as either fortresses or fortified vernacular and religious structures.

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