Most of Japan’s history–skirmishes and wars between feudal lords, legends surrounding ancestors of the Imperial Family, even the location of its capitals–played out on the southwestern end of the main island of Honshu, so it’s not surprising that most of its historic sights and World Heritage sites are also found there. But in Tohoku, the northern region of Honshu, Hiraizumi is a town I very much would have wanted to visit if I had been alive in 12th-century Japan.
It was created as a Buddhist heaven on earth, a place of sprawling temples, pagodas, sutras, gardens and quarters for hundreds of monks. It lasted only 100 years before being sacked by the man who would go on to become shogun over the land, but Hiraizumi’s influence on Japan was tremendous.
This article I wrote for BBC.com/travel, A Pure Land Inspired by Treachery, tells why. For more information on Iwate Prefecture, location of Hiraizumi, see my post Escape the Tourist Hordes in Japan’s Iwate Prefecture.
