This museum recreates an Osaka housing area from 1830. The city of Osaka was totally burned in 1829, so the most recent documents are from 1830. We were very lucky to have our guide and a docent or two to explain all of the exhibit.
The recreated area was about 1/8 the normal size of a city block. A block contained all of the stores etc needed for the community. Each city block had its own gates on each of the four sides which were closed and guarded at night.
This portion of the museum actually goes through a full 24 hours in the lighting, so during part of our stay it was nighttime with a moon, geese flying over the moon and three shooting stars. Now it took a guide, a couple of docent and Tim and Hugh to point out everything to me. Also we experienced a thunderstorm (no rain). Overall a wonderful visit…
The high structure is the fire tower – you can see the bell used to alert the residents of fire.Nighttime…and the moon, and gees
In 1830 the Japan had a hierarchical society – with the samurai at the top, followed by farmers, craftsmen and merchants.
A community bathhouse was recreated. Originally males and females shared the same bathhouse but this practiced ended in the late Edo period – We did learn that the wealthy, had private bathhouses.
Lockers in the bathhouseThis vessel contained cold water which residences were required to bath in before entering the bathhouse. At the corners of the room where the drains for the used water. The signs on the wall are advertisements of local merchants.Behind the partial wall is the steam sauna, the partial wall keeps in the steam. On the right is the display on how the water was heated.
The details in the village made the experience so rich… here are a few… One item almost impossible to capture in a photo was the complexity of the shutter and door systems used to open the buildings for day use and close them for night use. The shutters allowed the homeowner to look out but others to not see in.
Our docent showing us how the merchants expanded their display area in the day and locked up at night.Kitties on the roof… there were dogs too but they didn’t get a photograph.This hung from the roof of a home, indicating that water was needed from the water seller. The water seller would then enter the home and fill the pot in the kitchen area. Ropes open the skylight to let out the smoke from cooking.Umbrella – coated with persimmon tannin making them waterproof. I like the color.
Raincoats.The cleaning of kimonos- all kimonos are taken apart to clean and then sewed back together. That still occurs today.This village is accurately reproduced, it even has depressions on the street to depict the wearing away of the street resulting from water dripping off the roof. And, the depressions differed depending on the roofline.Nails used in construction. The docent asked me what angle would the nail be driven into the building on the outside. I had no idea –upward, of course, to keep the rainwater out of the building, so it wouldn’t rot. Of course!
Fascinating! What were raincoats made from?