gokenmon 五間門

A five-bay gate. A five-bay, three-opening gate is called *goken-sanko 五間三戸. Judging from excavations at the Fujiwara 藤原 and Heijō 平城 palace sites, in Nara, a gokenmon typically functioned as a middle gate *chūmon 中門. There are a variety of extant examples: Tōdaiji Chūmon 東大寺中門 (1717) in Nara, is a high gate *Rōmon 楼門; Tōfukuji *Sanmon 東福寺三門 (1428) in Kyoto, is a two-storied Zen style gate with five bays, and three entrances; and the *Jōmeimon 承明門 at Kyoto Gosho 京都御所 is a single storied five-bay wide gate constructed in 1855.