Shuri castle

The Seiden of Shuri castle.

• Type:　Gusuku
• Founder: Satto?
• Year: 1350?
• Destroyed: 1945
• Reconstructed: 1992
• Location: Shuri, Okinawa
• Japanese/Okinawan:首里城(Shuri-jou / Sui gusuku)

Shuri castle was the chief royal palace of the Kingdom of Ryûkyû, serving as the chief royal residence, political center of the kingdom, site of numerous rituals and ceremonies, and repository of numerous national heirlooms, official records and other artifacts.

Rebuilt beginning in 1992, following its destruction in the 1945 Battle of Okinawa, the castle grounds are now the nationally-funded "Shuri Castle Park". Along with a number of other gusuku and related sites across the island, Shuri Castle was designated a World Heritage Site in 2000.

History

It is not clear when the castle was built. Most sources place its construction during the reign of Satto, king of Chûzan (r. c. 1355-1395), some as early as 1237, but all agree that it was definitely built by 1427, during the reign of Shô Hashi (r. 1422-1439), first king of the united Kingdom of Ryûkyû.

Succession disputes which broke out following the death of King Shô Kinpuku in 1453 led to the destruction of the palace buildings at that time, and the loss of many artifacts including silver seals granted the kings of Ryûkyû by the Hongwu Emperor as signs of authority. The castle was rebuilt shortly afterward.

The reigns of Shô Shin (r. 1477-1526) and Shô Sei (r. 1527-1555) saw considerable renovation and expansion of the castle, including the construction or expansion of the outer ring of stone walls, addition of the stone dragon pillars at the entrance to the Seiden, and the construction of a number of temples and secondary buildings outside the castle complex proper, including the royal mausoleum of Tamaudun, completed in 1501. The castle would remain through the centuries largely in the form it took at this time.

It was famously sieged in 1609, when the kingdom fell to forces of the Shimazu clan of Satsuma han. Ryukyuan defenses fell quickly to the samurai invaders, who entered the castle on 1609/4/3; King Shô Nei surrendered two days later. The castle was looted: many artifacts and documents were stolen or destroyed, and the king was taken hostage along with the queen, crown prince, and a great many government advisors and officials. Shô Nei was allowed to return to Shuri, however, in 1611, and to resume governance of the kingdom, under the watchful eye and strict guidelines of Satsuma; Shuri castle remained the center of governance until the abolition of the kingdom in 1879.

Commodore Perry entered the castle on two occasions in 1853 and 1854, the gates opened for him out of fear that he might bring force to bear upon them were he denied entry. The Ryukyuans were successful, however, in denying him an audience with the king or dowager queen, holding to their insistence that the regent would be the highest ranking official Perry would be permitted to meet. Both marches on the castle served essentially as shows of force or authority for Perry, who wished to prove to himself (and to the Ryukyuans) that he was of sufficient power and authority to make demands such as these and to have them met.

Shuri castle was destroyed by fire at least five times in its history, most recently by Allied bombing in World War II; reconstruction began in 1992.

Records from the time indicate that when the castle was rebuilt in 1672, following a 1660 fire, the roofs were tiled where they had been previously covered in wooden shingles, as a precautionary measure towards better fire-proofing. Archaeological excavations, however, have found both Korean and Japanese roof tiles dating to before this fire, indicating that at least some sections of the castle bore tiled roofs much earlier. The castle burned again and was rebuilt in 1690 and 1709.

Layout

One section of the winding stone walls of the gusuku.

The castle is situated on a hill, 130m above sea level at its highest point, the main palace hall (Seiden) facing the west. The grounds cover roughly 46,000 square meters, extending roughly 400 meters from east to west, and 270 meters from north to south. The compound includes four gates in the outer wall, and eight gates in the inner complex.

Just beyond the castle walls could be found the Buddhist temple Engaku-ji and the Ryûtan and Enkan ponds which were constructed for the leisure and recreation of visiting Chinese investiture envoys.

The walls themselves were tall and thick, composed of stones fit together to form a smooth, steep surface difficult to climb. Flat, narrow walkways topped the walls, but they lacked merlons (aka battlements or crenelations) or loopholes which would have protected defenders atop the walls while allowing them to fire down upon invaders.

Shureimon

Shureimon

The stone gate to Sonohyan utaki

The symbolic entrance to the castle proper was the Shureimon, originally constructed around 1555, which remains today one of the most famous symbols of Okinawa, and specifically of the kingdom and the castle.

Just within the gate can be found the stone gate to Sonohyan utaki, a sacred space of the native Ryukyuan religion, where the king and others would often pray. The gate was constructed in 1519, upon the orders of King Shô Shin, by a stonemason from Taketomi Island named Nishitô.

Gates

Kankaimon

Kyûkeimon

Stairs flanked by investiture tablets.

Zuisenmon

Rokokumon

Beyond the symbolic Shureimon, the main gate granting entry through the first set of walls of the compound is the Kankaimon, flanked by two stone shisa (lion dogs). Like most of the gates in the walls of Shuri Castle, the Kankaimon consists of a gap in the stone wall, with a wooden structure atop it, with a flared tiled roof.

A short distance down the wall from the Kankaimon is the Kyûkeimon, the women's gate, which is elevated somewhat, and reached by a short staircase.

Upon entering the Kankaimon or Kyûkeimon, a visitor, official, or royal would next ascend a set of stairs flanked by seven stone tablets of investiture, representing prior kings and the authority of the Throne. Even the king himself would dismount here from his palanquin and bow before proceeding further into the complex.

These stairs lead to the Zuisenmon, a red-painted wooden structure perched atop a gap in the stone wall. Zuisen means, essentially, "spring of beauty/purity/youth and good fortune."

The path into the castle is never straight, the gates often situated at right angles to one another, in theory slowing an invading army and leaving attackers quite open to fire from defenders, stationed in the wooden gate structures and armed with Chinese-style firearms or bows & arrows. Stephen Turnbull notes, however, that the gates, and castle walls in general, lacked loopholes or other defensive features for defenders to hide behind. All in all, when the castle was invaded by Satsuma samurai in 1609, it fell quite quickly.

The next gate after the Zuisenmon is the Rôkokumon, or "Water Clock Gate", the final stone gate, which leads to a small plaza where a replica of the famous Bridge of Nations Bell is today kept inside a small structure called the Tomoya.

Shicha-nu-Unâ

Kôfukumon

Suimui utaki

Hôshinmon

The Kôfukumon, a large, vermillion wooden structure which housed administrative offices, leads finally into the shicha-nu-unâ, an area equivalent to what would be called the second bailey in English or ni-no-maru in a Japanese castle.

The shicha-nu-unâ contains the　"Shuri forest utaki", or Suimui utaki, a sacred grove surrounded by its own low stone walls.

Another large, vermillion wooden gate, the Hôshinmon, leads into the central bailey, or unâ (J: honmaru).

Unâ

The unâ (central plaza), with the Nanden seen on the right of the Seiden.

The Unâ is a square, open plaza, bounded by the Hôshinmon on one side, the Seiden, the chief royal residence, facing it, and the Hokuden and Nanden on the remaining two sides. The plaza itself was the site of many important rituals and ceremonies, including New Year's ceremonies, and the formal investiture of each king, for which a symbolic model of the Chinese Imperial Court throne room would be constructed on the plaza. The plaza, and buildings within it, were conceived as a miniature of the Forbidden City (the Imperial Palace) in Beijing.

The Nanden, or "South Hall," on one size of the plaza, is a Japanese-style structure which housed Satsuma officials; the Hokuden, or "North Hall," facing it across the plaza, is a more Chinese-style structure, which housed visiting Chinese officials. Both also housed some of the chief administrative offices of the royal government.

Seiden

The chief royal residence, or Seiden, the building at the heart of Shuri castle, faces and overlooks the unâ. The largest wooden building in the Ryûkyû Kingdom, it is three stories tall, and lavishly painted and otherwise decorated in vermillion and gold, with intricate carvings and other embellishments painted in bold colors. Its construction incorporates Chinese, Japanese, and native Okinawan architectural elements, including among many other features a Japanese karahafu gabled arch over the entrance, and Chinese-style two-tiered roof modeled upon that of the Chinese Imperial Palace.

Two stone dragon pillars flank the central stair of the Seiden; these, like just about everything on the grounds today, are reconstructions, though pieces of the pre-1945 pillars are now housed at the Okinawa Prefectural Museum. While most elements of the castle's design reflects Chinese, Korean, and Japanese influence, these dragon pillars resemble not those found anywhere in East Asia, but rather, a form typically seen in palaces and temples of Cambodia and Thailand, two of the many regions with which Ryûkyû traded heavily in the 14th-16th centuries.

A series of sliding doors at the center of the front of the building opened directly onto the main audience chamber, above which (on the second floor) was the throne room; the two were connected by a narrow staircase, allowing the king, queen, and other top-ranking royals and officials to make their appearance traveling directly from the throne room to the audience chamber.

The throne room itself was decorated lavishly in gold and vermillion, as the entire Seiden was, inside and out. Two dragon pillars, painted gold, flank the throne, a Chinese-style chair elaborately carved and painted gold and vermillion as well. Plaques given as gifts to the king by Chinese Emperors, bearing inscriptions of the Emperors' own calligraphy, adorn the throne room.

References

• Inoue, Munekazu. Nihon no Meijô (日本の名城, "Famous Castles of Japan"). Yuzankaku Publishing, 1992.
• Kerr, George. Okinawa: The History of an Island People. Revised Edition. Tokyo: Tuttle Publishing, 2000.
• "Shuri-jô." Okinawa konpakuto jiten (沖縄コンパクト事典, "Okinawa Compact Encyclopedia"). Ryukyu Shimpo. 1 March 2003. Accessed 16 January 2010.
• Turnbull, Stephen. The Samurai Capture a King: Okinawa 1609. Oxford: Osprey Press, 2009.

Official Site

• Shuri castle park