Osaka Castle, and how to read a Japanese castle

Osaka Castle stands in a large park in the middle of the city, its white and green main tower rising above massive stone walls and moats. It is one of the most visited sights in Japan, and it is easy to reach from several train stations around the park.

A short history

The castle was begun in the 1580s by Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the warlord who unified Japan at the end of the Sengoku period. It was destroyed and rebuilt more than once over the following centuries. The main tower you see today is a 1931 reconstruction in concrete, and inside it is a museum about the castle and Hideyoshi's time, with a lift and an observation floor at the top.

Look at the walls

The tower is the photograph, but the stone walls are the real thing. Some of the stones are enormous, fitted together without mortar. Walk the outer moat and the gates, and you get a much better sense of the scale of the original fortress than from inside the tower.

Original or rebuilt?

Japan has many castles, but most of their main towers are modern reconstructions. Only a small number of original keeps from the Edo period or earlier survive, Himeji and Matsumoto being the best known. Rebuilt towers are still worth visiting; just know what you are looking at.

When to go

• Spring: the park is one of Osaka's popular spots for cherry blossoms, and there is a plum grove that flowers earlier, in late winter.
• Autumn: comfortable weather for walking the grounds.
• Any season: go early in the morning, before the tour groups.

Leave time for the park itself. It is where many people in Osaka come to jog, walk and sit, and that ordinary life is part of the view too.

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Photos: nagi, webkims, hanshinlyon on Pixabay, used under the Pixabay Content License. These are not my photographs.