Image from New York Public Library, via Wikimedia Commons
When you go to Osaka, it’s best to particularly see two historical buildings: Osaka Citadel and Shitennoji Temple (above), Japan’s first Buddhist temple. Each had been constructed by the development firm Kongo Gumi Kongo Gumi is the oldest constantly working firm on the earth. The corporate was based in 578 when Shitennoji Temple was constructed by order of Prince Shotoku. On the time, “Shintoism was the mainstream in Japan, Shrine carpenter (A carpenter who realized the strategies of constructing Buddhist temples) Eileen Herrera writes: Works, “So the prince employed three expert males from Baekje, a Buddhist kingdom in what’s now Korea,” considered one of whom was named Kongo Shigetsu.
Kongo Gumi continued to be run independently by 40 generations of Kongo Shigetsu’s descendants for greater than 1,400 years. By the point Toyotomi Hideyoshi ordered the corporate to construct Osaka Citadel in 1583, the corporate had been in existence for nearly 1,000 years. Over the centuries since, “the fort was destroyed many instances by fireplace and lightning,” Herrera writes. “These main rebuilds offered ample work for Kongo Gumi, and so they prospered.” All through most of their lengthy historical past, their specialty, constructing Buddhist temples, offered a extra secure enterprise, no less than till the twentieth century, when this enterprise mannequin bumped into severe issues.
“World Conflict II introduced nice modifications to Japan and the demand for temple development decreased.” Tourism company Toki says:“Sensing a altering pattern, the corporate made the strategic resolution to channel its experience into a brand new enterprise: coffin making.” The federal government permission was organized by the widow of Kongo Haruichi, the thirty seventh head of Kongo Gumi, who took his personal life out of economic despair attributable to the Showa Despair of the Twenties. Right here, his tenure on the helm of the corporate signifies a longstanding willingness handy management duties to the member of the family finest suited to the job, not simply the eldest son. As such, the Kongo clan’s historical past options quite a few sons-in-law intentionally sought out for the aim.
The mixed results of the decline of Buddhism and the collapse of Japan’s actual property bubble within the Nineties pressured Kongo Gumi to turn into a subsidiary of the Takamatsu Development Group in January 2006. “At present, there is just one worker at Kongo Gumi who’s from the Kongo household.” Nikkei Asia reported in 2020“She is the daughter of the fortieth head of the household” and “is at present the forty first head of the household.” Nevertheless, Shrine carpenter — Divided into eight separate organizations KumiThe Kongo Gumi group, or group of craftsmen, continues to do the identical work as earlier than, however with refinements to the normal instruments and strategies which have been used for nearly 150 years. Kongo Gumi continues to draw worldwide consideration for sustaining its excessive requirements of workmanship, however viewers of latest American tv dramas can even be grateful that Kongo Gumi has resolved the problem of succession.
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Primarily based in Seoul, Colin MaOnershall Writing and broadcastingHe has written papers on cities, languages, and cultures, and his tasks embody the Substack publication. Books about cities And books A metropolis with no state: Strolling by Twenty first-century Los Angeles. Comply with us on Twitter CollinhamOnershall or Facebook.
