Buddhist monasteries · The Kamakura house and its housemen · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Chūsonji

Chūsonji is the temple on Mount Kanzan at Hiraizumi that the Fujiwara built and endowed.

It survived the burning of the city in 1189, the English page says, and went into decline. In 1200 it is a Tendai monastery with the gilded Konjikidō of 1124 (the Fujiwara mausoleum) and the sutra library still standing, a great many halls and pagodas still recalled (the Azuma Kagami counts more than forty halls and pagodas and over three hundred monks' dwellings), its endowments cut, and its clergy dependent on the goodwill of the Ōshū commissioner and Yoritomo's heirs. It is Mutsu's greatest holy place and its clergy are the keepers of the memory of the Fujiwara.

Who holds it

Name
not pinned for 1200
Title
Abbot and monks of Chūsonji
Since
not applicable
Family
The Konjikidō holds the Fujiwara lords' remains (English Wikipedia).
Confidence
medium

English Wikipedia (Chūson-ji): founded in 850 by Ennin by the temple's own tradition and in 1095 by Fujiwara no Kiyohira by Sansom; the Konjikidō completed in 1124; more than forty halls and pagodas and three hundred monks' dwellings by the Azuma Kagami; survived the destruction of Hiraizumi in 1189 but declined; fire in 1337.

Overlord

The Tendai superiors; Kasai Kiyoshige as the commissioner for the north

What it holds

  • The hill, the Konjikidō, the sutra library and halls
  • What is left of the temple estates (not itemised)

How it was acquired

Built by the Fujiwara from 1095 (page).

Allies and rivals

Depends on Kamakura's stewards; rivals: the Mōtsūji ruins.

How things stand that morning

In decline, standing.

Wealth

Offerings; shrunken estates; no figure.

Threats

  • Neglect; fire

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

  1. 1337Fire destroys most of the temple (English Wikipedia).Depends on: Fire Stopped by: Not known: no source says what would prevent it.

Where the sources disagree

  • The founding is 850 in the temple's tradition and 1095 in Sansom; the brief and the campaign board do not say. The page gives no patronage by Yoritomo after 1189 (he is recalled as confirming the temple's rights).

Evidence: A good English page for the structure; nothing for 1190 to 1200.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

On the map: Small disc; the town round it is the Hiraizumi record.

Primary sources for Kamakura regime

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

  • Hundred Times Refined Extracts: court annals (late thirteenth century, from court diaries). Short dated annals of the imperial court excerpted from courtiers' diaries, among them the Gyokuyo and the Meigetsuki. Read online
  • Mirror of the East, Anonymous; compiled by officials of the Kamakura shogunate (compiled about 1300 from the shogunate's records, diaries and family documents). The Kamakura house's own chronicle, in daily entries. Read online
  • Jottings of a Fool: an interpretative history of Japan, Jien (慈円) (about 1219 to 1220, revised to about 1223). A history by Kujo Kanezane's brother, head of the Tendai school and the leading churchman of the court, written to explain the fall of the Kujo and the rise of the warriors as the working of principle (dori). Read online
  • Diary of the Inokuma Regent: the diary of Konoe Iezane, Konoe Iezane (近衛家実) (1197 to 1218, as a daily diary). The diary of the regent's heir, aged twenty-one in 1200 and already a senior courtier under his father Konoe Motomichi, who was regent (sessho) for the child emperor Tsuchimikado. Read online
  • Leaves of Jade: the diary of Kujo Kanezane, Kujo (Fujiwara) Kanezane (九條兼實) (1164 to 1200, as a daily diary). The diary of the former regent, Yoritomo's ally at court, who had been driven from power in the Kenkyu purge of 1196 and lived in retirement in 1200. Read online
  • Record of the Bright Moon: the diary of Fujiwara no Teika, Fujiwara no Teika (藤原定家) (1180 to 1235, as a daily diary, with gaps). The diary of the poet and courtier, then thirty-eight and a middle-ranking official of the Kujo house. Read online
  • Surviving Documents of the Kamakura Period, Various; collected by Takeuchi Rizo (竹内理三) (documents of 1185 to 1333, collected and printed 1971 to 1997). The collected charters, deeds, court orders, shogunal directives, temple records and land registers of the Kamakura age, printed in date order. Read online
  • The Tale of the Heike, Anonymous; traditionally attributed to Shinano no Zenji Yukinaga, performed and reshaped by blind reciters (early thirteenth century in its first form; the standard Kakuichi text was fixed in 1371). The epic of the Genpei war, in the form the reciters gave it over the century after 1200. Read online

Sources and studies

  1. KJA_BRIEF.md and the OMNIA board for sheet kja (the lead's notes: [own] computation, [not yet checked against the source] recollection, [en] English Wikipedia)
  2. Azuma Kagami (the Kamakura chronicle), Kenkyu 10 to Shoji 2 entries, recalled and through the brief; ja.wikipedia and ja.wikisource were refused in this session, so no entry was re-read
  3. Jeffrey P. Mass, Warrior Government in Early Medieval Japan (1974), from memory; the archive.org full text could not be opened
  4. English Wikipedia: Chūson-ji (read this session; thin)
  5. English Wikipedia: Northern Fujiwara (read this session; thin)

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.