Fukuyama Castle

Overview

Fukuyama Castle (福山城, Fukuyama-jō) is a Japanese castle in Fukuyama, a city in Hiroshima Prefecture on the coast of the Seto Inland Sea. It was built in 1619, in the fifth year of the Genna era (元和, Genna), and served as the seat of the Fukuyama Domain (福山藩, Fukuyama-han) through the Edo period, the stretch of Japanese history running from 1603 to 1868. The castle grounds were designated a National Historic Site in 1964, and the site is listed among the 100 Fine Castles of Japan (日本100名城, Nihon Meijō), a registry maintained by the Japanese Castle Foundation. The castle stands in Fukuyama Park, close to Fukuyama Station, and the grounds today hold a dense cluster of institutions, including the Fukuyama Castle Museum, the Fukuyama Museum of Art, the Fukuyama Museum of Literature, the Hiroshima Prefectural Museum of History, the Fukuyama Human Rights and Peace Museum, and the Fukuju Kaikan.

History

Fukuyama Castle was founded in 1619, the fifth year of Genna, at the beginning of the Edo period. The Tokugawa shogunate had consolidated power after the decisive campaign of 1600 and the fall of Osaka Castle in 1615, and castles built in this era were administrative headquarters for the domains into which the country was divided rather than fortresses expecting siege. Fukuyama Domain was the political unit the castle served, and the castle was its headquarters.

The castle's later history includes a conflagration and a reconstruction, and it was caught up in the Boshin War (戊辰戦争, Boshin Sensō), the civil war of 1868–1869 that ended the Tokugawa shogunate and opened the Meiji period. Matsumae Takahiro (松前崇広), a prominent figure of the late Edo period, is recorded both as born and as having died at the castle.

What Stands There Today

The castle grounds are a National Historic Site and now function as a public park, Fukuyama Park, immediately beside Fukuyama Station. Several structures and institutions occupy the site. The Fukuyama Castle Museum presents the castle's history. The Fukuyama Museum of Art, the Fukuyama Museum of Literature, and the Hiroshima Prefectural Museum of History all stand within the grounds, as does the Fukuyama Human Rights and Peace Museum. Religious structures on the site include Bingo Gokoku Shrine (備後護国神社, Bingo Gokoku Jinja) and Sanzō Inari Shrine (三蔵稲荷神社, Sanzō Inari Jinja). The Fushimi-yagura (伏見櫓), a surviving turret, and the Fukuju Kaikan (福寿会館) are also part of the complex.

The Name in Japanese

The castle's name in Japanese is 福山城. It is read ふくやまじょう in kana, and written in romaji as Fukuyama-jō.

Broken down character by character:

• 福 — read fuku in this word. It means "fortune", "good luck", or "blessing". It is the same character used in the name of the city, Fukuyama.
• 山 — read yama in this word. It means "mountain". The two characters together, 福山, mean "fortunate mountain" and form the place name Fukuyama.
• 城 — read jō in this word. It means "castle". When it appears alone as a common noun it is read shiro; in compound names like this one it takes the Sino-Japanese reading jō.

So the whole name means "Fukuyama Castle", with the first two characters supplying the place name and the third identifying the building type. The pattern is extremely common in Japanese castle names: 大阪城 (Ōsaka-jō), 姫路城 (Himeji-jō), 熊本城 (Kumamoto-jō) all follow the same structure of place name plus 城.

The castle has also been called 久松城 (Hisamatsu-jō) and 葦陽城 (Iyō-jō). In 久松城, the characters are 久 (hisa, "long-lasting"), 松 (matsu, "pine"), and 城 (jō, "castle"). In 葦陽城, they are 葦 (i, "reed"), 陽 (yō, "sun" or "yang"), and 城 (jō, "castle").

Visiting and Context

Fukuyama Castle sits in Fukuyama, Hiroshima Prefecture, at coordinates 34.4910389, 133.3611222, in Fukuyama Park near Fukuyama Station. The station is a stop on the Sanyō Shinkansen, the high-speed rail line running along the Inland Sea coast between Osaka and Fukuoka, which makes the castle one of the more accessible of the 100 Fine Castles of Japan.

For a reader studying Japanese, the castle's name is a useful piece of vocabulary. The character 城 appears in the names of dozens of castles across the country, and the reading shift between shiro when it stands alone and jō when it is attached to a place name is a pattern worth internalising early. The place name 福山, meanwhile, shows how Japanese place names are frequently assembled from two meaningful characters rather than being arbitrary labels — 福 for fortune and 山 for mountain.