The Five-Story Pagoda

Standing quietly in Koyama Park in Yamaguchi City, this five-story pagoda is a National Treasure completed around 1442, roughly five hundred eighty years ago. Rising 31.2 meters high, with layers of cypress bark shingles creating a graceful roofline, its silhouette is unforgettable once seen. It stands alongside Daigoji Temple in Kyoto and Horyu-ji Temple in Nara as one of Japan's three most celebrated pagodas.

This tower was built in memory of a fallen warrior. Ouchi Morisada, the 26th lord of the Ouchi clan, vowed to construct this pagoda to honor the memory of his brother, Ouchi Yoshihiro, who had fallen in the Oei Rebellion. Yet Morisada himself was destined never to see the tower's completion, dying in battle in Kyushu. The dramatic lives of these two brothers are forever inscribed in this single structure.

Notice the deep eaves and the graceful upward curves of the roof. Despite its slender form, the pagoda conveys an unmovable presence. Known as "the supreme masterpiece of Ouchi culture," its beauty was officially designated as a National Treasure in 1952. As evening falls and the tower is illuminated, it shines with extraordinary brilliance in the quiet night. We invite you to linger and appreciate the flow of time this ancient structure embodies.