Saiki Castle

Saiki, Japan, Japan

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Saiki Castle is the ruin of an Edo-period mountain castle on a 144-meter hill in the center of Saiki city in Ōita Prefecture, Kyushu, Japan.

It was built in 1606 by Mori Takamasa, the first lord of the small Saiki domain, and originally called Tsuruya or Tsuruga Castle, with a three-story main keep, several turrets, and multiple gates, making it unusually grand for a 20,000-koku domain. The main keep burned down in 1617 just eleven years after construction, and after that the castle’s center was shifted to the expanded sannomaru (third enclosure), while the Mori family ruled from the site for twelve generations until the Meiji abolition of the feudal system in 1871.

Today only stone walls, dry moats, gate foundations, and the third-enclosure turret gate survive, but the ruins are protected as a National Historic Site (since 2023) and are listed among the Continued 100 Fine Castles of Japan, and the site is a popular park especially for cherry blossoms in spring, with hiking trails and panoramic views over Saiki city and the bay.