page_title: Japanese garden
section_title: Kamakura and Muromachi periods (1185–1573)
hierarchical_section_title: Japanese garden / History / Kamakura and Muromachi periods (1185–1573)
caption_attribution_description: English: Kinkaku-ji ("Temple of the Golden Pavillion) is one of the most popular buildings of Japan. The building is majestic and the garden is beautiful. There is a reason people flock to see this temple. Fun fact: the building was burned down by a monk in 1950.
context_page_description: Japanese gardens are traditional gardens whose designs are accompanied by Japanese aesthetics and philosophical ideas, avoid artificial ornamentation, and highlight the natural landscape. Plants and worn, aged materials are generally used by Japanese garden designers to suggest an ancient and faraway natural landscape, and to express the fragility of existence as well as time's unstoppable advance.
  Ancient Japanese art inspired past garden designers. By the Edo period, the Japanese garden had its own distinct appearance.
context_section_description: The weakness of the Emperors and the rivalry of feudal warlords resulted in two civil wars (1156 and 1159), which destroyed most of Kyoto and its gardens. The capital moved to Kamakura, and then in 1336 back to the Muromachi quarter of Kyoto. The Emperors ruled in name only; real power was held by a military governor, the shōgun. During this period, the Government reopened relations with China, which had been broken off almost three hundred years earlier. Japanese monks went again to study in China, and Chinese monks came to Japan, fleeing the Mongol invasions. The monks brought with them a new form of Buddhism, called simply Zen, or "meditation". The first zen garden in Japan was built by a Chinese priest in 1251 in Kamakura. Japan enjoyed a renaissance in religion, in the arts, and particularly in gardens.
  Many famous temple gardens were built early in this period, including Kinkaku-ji, The Golden Pavilion, built in 1398, and Ginkaku-ji, The Silver Pavilion, built in 1482. In some ways they followed Zen principles of spontaneity, extreme simplicity and moderation, but in other ways they were traditional Chinese Song-Dynasty Temples; the upper floors of the Golden Pavilion were covered with gold leaf, and they were surrounded by traditional water gardens.
  The most notable garden style invented in this period was the zen garden, or Japanese rock garden. One of the finest examples, and one of the best-known of all Japanese gardens is Ryōan-ji in Kyoto. This garden is just 9 meters wide and 24 meters long. It is composed of white sand carefully raked to suggest water, and fifteen rocks carefully arranged, like small islands. It is meant to be seen from a seated position on the porch of the residence the abbot of the monastery. There have been many debates about what the rocks are supposed to represent, but, as garden historian Gunter Nitschke wrote, "The garden at Ryōan-ji does not symbolize. It does not have the value of representing any natural beauty that can be found in the world, real or mythical. I consider it as an abstract composition of "natural" objects in space, a composition whose function is to incite mediation."
  Several of the famous zen gardens of Kyoto were the work of one man; Musō Soseki (1275–1351). He was a monk, a ninth-generation descendant of the Emperor Uda. He was also a formidable court politician, writer and organizer, who armed and financed ships to open trade with China, and founded an organization called the Five Mountains, made up of the most powerful Zen monasteries in Kyoto. He was responsible for the building of the zen gardens of Nanzen-ji; Saihō-ji (The Moss Garden); and Tenryū-ji.
  Notable gardens of the Kamakura and Muromachi Periods include:
  Kinkaku-ji (the Golden Pavilion)
  Ginkaku-ji (the Silver Pavilion)
  Nanzen-ji
  Saihō-ji (The Moss Garden)
  Tenryū-ji
  Daisen-in
caption: Kinkaku-ji, the Golden Pavilion (1398)
exif: {"Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D750", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "240", "Image YResolution": "240", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6.1 (Macintosh)", "Image DateTime": "2015:12:13 21:35:32", "Image Artist": "Arup Malakar", "Image ExifOffset": "244", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1000", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "21043", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/160", "EXIF FNumber": "14", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Aperture Priority", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "160", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2015:10:28 21:29:59", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2015:10:28 21:29:59", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "915241/125000", "EXIF ApertureValue": "761471/100000", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "4", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "16", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "73", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "73", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "54886891/32768", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "54886891/32768", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "3", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[2, 0, 2, 0, 0, 1, 1, 2]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "16", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF BodySerialNumber": "3023120", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[16, 35, 4, 4]", "EXIF LensModel": "16.0-35.0 mm f/4.0"}