Fukuoka Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

Fukuoka Castle covers a vast area at the heart of the modern city, on a site known as Fukuzaki. Rewarded for his part at Sekigahara with the province of Chikuzen, Kuroda Nagamasa abandoned Najima Castle as early as 1601 and had his new residence built here; work continued until 1607. The castle town then took the name Fukuoka and grew up alongside the merchant city of Hakata. The protected site now extends over about 48 hectares, taking in the inner enclosures of the honmaru, ninomaru and sannomaru as well as several sections of moat. Forty-seven turrets are recorded here in the Edo period, but the most debated question concerns the keep. Three platforms, large, medium and small, survive, yet whether a keep ever stood on them has not been established: a plan of 1643 shows none, and documents cited more recently have reopened the debate. The City of Fukuoka has begun excavating the large platform, the first digs at this spot despite more than fifty campaigns across the site as a whole; crested roof tiles and traditional nails have been unearthed, with no conclusion published so far in the documents consulted. The army occupied the grounds from 1872 to 1945, after which sports facilities moved in; it was beneath the former Heiwadai baseball stadium that the remains of the Kōrokan, an ancient diplomatic establishment, were identified in 1987, which explains why part of the site enjoys double protection.