For my scavenger hunt I was told to “find the site where Oda
Nobunaga died.” Naturally I turned to
google first to find out more about Nobunaga’s death. I found that Oda Nobunaga was staying at a
Buddhist Temple called Honnoji when he was betrayed by one of his armies, led
by Akechi Mitsuhide. They surrounded the
temple and the fight ended with the temple burning to the ground and Nobunaga
committing ritual suicide.
I
used google maps to find the location of the temple and headed there with a
friend after class. We got off at the
Sanjou station and ended up walking through a shopping district that was
crammed with every type of shop imaginable.
I was beginning to wonder where the temple could be in all of this when
all of a sudden we turned to our right and saw the entrance to the temple among
the row of shops. I was surprised by
this location but glad it wasn’t too hard of a find.
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| The shopping district we walked through |
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| Entrance to the temple |
We
first walked up to the temple itself to get a closer look. It’s a pretty ordinary temple and nothing too
major stood out. Next we took a look
around the back of the temple where there were several monuments. At times like this I wish I knew more kanji
and could read about what all these monuments are for. I was able to figure out, however, that one
of them was a memorial to Oda Nobunaga, the reason I came in the first
place. This was exciting and I was glad
I was able to find it. After this, we
went inside the temple, which was decorated with beautiful gold ornamentation
and a giant Buddha statue. I was very
impressed by the interior decoration, as it was such a contrast to the rather
dull exterior. (Unfortunately, pictures
of the inside weren’t allowed so you’ll just have to take my word for it.) Finally, we explored a cemetery near the
temple with rows and rows of old graves.
On our way out, we tried to enter the temple’s museum, which includes
many Oda Nobunaga related artifacts.
Unfortunately, it was closed and we couldn’t enter, but I plan on going
back in the future.
My mission
accomplished, we left the temple with a sense of accomplishment and went to
explore the rest of the area.
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| The temple |
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| Memorial to Oda Nobunaga |
3 comments:
I've walked through that shopping district, it's easy to get lost in it! Though looks like both our temples were a bit difficult to find.
I think i've been by there too! It's so interesting how the city grew around all the historical landmarks.
HAHAHA, I have been there too when I was travelling in Osaka~ The temple looks quite small here. I wanna know how many temples in Osaka?
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