Description of the attraction
The Tosho-gu temple complex was formed around the tomb of the shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu. According to legend, dying, the shogun obliged large feudal lords to contribute to the construction of, in fact, his own monument.
The ruler and commander Tokugawa Ieyasu led the country at the turn of the 16th-17th centuries and managed to end the bloody internecine wars waged by the feudal lords who were redrawing their possessions. His last decision to build a Tosho-gu temple was also supposed to be a reminder of the power and importance of centralized government. The best artisans of Japan participated in the construction of the temple, more than nine thousand people worked at the construction site every day, and after 17 months the construction was completed. One of the feudal lords was so poor that he was obliged to plant trees near the temple, which he did for 20 years. The finale of his work was an alley of 300-year-old Japanese cryptomeria. The length of the alley is 38 kilometers, the number of trees is 16 thousand. Now it separates the temple from the city of Nikko, located 140 km from Tokyo.
In 1999, the Shinto Shrine Tosho-gu and other temples in the city were included in the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The eight buildings of the Tosho-gu temple and two sacred swords belonging to the temple are national treasures of Japan. The center of the complex is a bronze urn with the remains of Tokugawa Ieyasu, to which a long staircase with stone steps leads.
The Tosho-gu temple complex includes 22 buildings, including stone torii - the Yomeimon and Karamon ritual gates, made in the Japanese Baroque style. They are lavishly decorated with décor inspired by Chinese decorative arts. In the jewelry, you can see the characters of Chinese mythology - fish, dragons, phoenixes, birds, and other creatures. Several buildings are designed in traditional Japanese style and are more restrained and laconic. The total area of the complex is 80 thousand square meters. meters.
Once the ruler of Japan chose Nikko as his resting place, today this city is one of the oldest centers of pilgrimage in the country, there are several Buddhist and Shinto temples.
