2011-06-16

Historic Monuments and Sites of Hiraizumi

Historic Monuments and Sites of Hiraizumi

Historic Monuments and Sites of Hiraizumi is a group of six sites from late eleventh- and twelfth-century Hiraizumi, Iwate Prefecture, Japan. Proposed jointly in 2001 for inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage List under criteria ii, iii, iv, and vi, the submission currently resides on the Tentative List. Approved by advisory body ICOMOS, inscription is expected to be forthcoming in June 2011.

Hiraizumi

For four generations from c.1087, when Fujiwara no Kiyohira moved his headquarters and residence from further north, until 1189, when the army of Minamoto no Yoritomo put an end to the Northern Fujiwara, Hiraizumi served as an important political, military, commercial, and cultural centre. Several major temples associated with Pure Land Buddhism were founded and endowed, but the demise of their benefactors and a series of fires contributed to their subsequent decline. When Bashō visited in 1689 he was moved to write, in Oku no Hosomichi: summer grass... remains of soldiers' dreams. A series of excavations from the mid-twentieth century onwards combined with references in Azuma Kagami, in particular the Bunji-no-chūmon petition of 1189, and the Shōwa sojō or 'monks' appeal' of 1313 from the Chūson-ji archives, has contributed much to the understanding of the sites and the period.

Monuments

See also

References

Further reading

Yiengpruksawan, Mimi Hall (1998). Hiraizumi: Buddhist Art and Regional Politics in Twelfth-Century Japan. Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-39205-1.

External links






Retrieved from : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historic_Monuments_and_Sites_of_Hiraizumi
Posted by at