Large wooden shingles which are about 30 cm wide and are laid from the ridge to the eaves. Where the shingles need to be…

A load-bearing structural member. Refers to any structural element which supports the roof including pillars *…

Also called wadaruki 輪垂木. An open ceiling found in Buddhist temples of the Ōbaku 黄檗 sect. The architectural style…

Also called obisando 帯桟戸. A simple wooden door made of thin boards with rails at top and bottom and stiles, left…

Also obiki 尾引. Sleepers about 10 cm sq. that extend horizontally at right angle to posts that are erected on a sill…

A outer veranda constructed a step lower than the adjacent floor. It may also be constructed one step lower than a broad…

The junction point of a horizontal and diagonal structural member. For example, the point where the bottom of the hip rafter…

A tail rafter. A large rafter which usually extends through the second step of a 3-stepped bracket complex *…

Also called da-itabuki 駄板葺. A shingled roof which has bamboo battens and or stones to hold the shingles in place.…

Lit. "praying."
1　Structural elements arranged in such a way as to resemble the image of hands joined in…

Fan rafters. There are two arrangements: those that radiate from a center point on each side of the building; or those that…

A bottle strut *taiheizuka 大瓶束, with a sculptural decoration called …

A wall which is completely plastered so that the pillars or posts are not visible. This method is common for the…

1　A style or method of constructing a wall, in which the basic framework for plastering is made on the…

1　Charming, or delightful. An approach to the aesthetic indicating a carefree appreciation of objects and…

Shogun Ashikaga's 足利 book of tea ceremony implement arrangement, thought to have been written by Sōami 相阿弥 (1455-1525), a…

Also called tate-ezu 建絵図. A fold-up, three-dimensional plan drawn on paper, to show the interior of rooms assembled…

1　The interior or heart of something. The furthermost, innermost or ultimate space in a sequence of spaces…

An inner sanctuary. The part of a temple most remote from the main entrance. An example is the Keikyū-in 桂宮院, at Kōryūji…

Also called uketo 受斗. A bearing block, longer than but shaped very much like the *…

The depth or distance from front to rear of an object, piece of furniture, room, building, plot of land etc. It may be…

A general term for structural members that sustain pressure horizontally. Transverse beams *…

1　A gate mon 門, with multiple pillars with large intervals between them.
One example is…

Lit. "the front, surface, or exterior of something."
1　The front part of a house and the area around the…

Also *mune 棟, *munagi…

The second layer of a plastered wall. The first layer of a plastered wall is made of a rough clay-sod or mud-plaster mixture…

A type of saw horse on which to place timber so that a carpenter can cut it easily. Two posts are sunk directly into the…

Lit. "a big eave." An eave made of long base rafters *jidaruki 地垂木, which is…

An archaic term for a tie beam roughly 3.6 m long by 11 cm wide by 2.5 cm thick. Cedar or cypress were commonly used. Now…

A coved and coffered ceiling. The coved part has curved struts. It surrounds the coffered ceiling and at the same time…

A coved, coffered and finely latticed ceiling. When the height of a ceiling of the same type is increased by curved struts…

A coved ceiling. A ceiling raised by diagonally placed straight timbers *shirin…

Also orioki 折置. Method of assembly in a building's structural frame. A method of fixing a transverse beam *…

Neocene quartz. A type of soft volcanic tuff that is rough, porous and easily worked. It is a light, bluish greenish brown…

1　The board-floor veranda at the top of the steps of a shrine building. The veranda at the bottom of the…

Also written 櫓烟出. Also read yagura kemuridashi. An opening constructed in a thatched roof to allow the escape of…

Commonly double-penetrating, diagonally placed beams that connect the main post *…

1　A ceiling with the same pitch as the roof. Really, an exposed ceiling *…

1　The parts of a stone wall such as exterior corners, top surfaces, or openings for drainage where…

A window used especially in the Zen style *zenshūyō 禅宗様; a type of ogival…

1　An abbreviation for yamatouchi-no-to 大和打の戸 or yamatouchi 大和打. A door that has vertical…

1　A type of board roofing made by first spacing boards of equal width at predetermined intervals and then…

A generic name for various types of roofing boards including *noji-ita…

The construction of the roof framework or roof truss over the body of a building. The essential framing for a gable roof *…

Also called okugai 屋蓋, lit. "roof covering." A generic term for various types of roofs, roof styles, and roofing.…

Roofing or roof covering. The most commonly used types of roofing are clay tiles *…

Rethatching, retiling, or reshingling a roof whereby old roofing is replaced with new roofing.

Also kobanekugi 小羽根釘. Small round bamboo roofing nails, with a diameter between 2.1 to 2.8 mm and a length from 50…

1　See *keshō yaneura 化粧屋根裏.

2　An…

Lit. "broken well crib." Also yabureigeta. A design used for muntins *kumiko…

Lit. "eight-ridge construction." A complicated roof style with multiple ridges and bargeboards, or large vernacular house…

A method of stone-splitting achieved by boring a hole in the stone. A wedge *kusabi…

The Yayoi period (ca. 400 BCE to 250 CE). The period is marked by the establishment of rice cultivation and an agrarian…

A suffix. When used in architectural history, it means a technical style, as in *…

Also yodogi 淀木 or yodonuki 淀貫. Tapered horizontal timber, 12-15 cm wide and 4.5 cm thick, placed on top of…

Also called chikara gane 力鉄 or kanehōzu-e 鉄方杖.
Slender iron rods used to strengthen the extensions of…

1　Horizontal, parallel boards with a wood grain that runs sideways. In shrine architecture *…

Also called *oshibuchi 押縁. Narrow, thin battens placed horizontally over…

Closely spaced horizontal crosspieces commonly found on latticed doors *mairado…

1　The horizontal line of a bamboo joint.

2　The line carved into the short posts at…

Also called nakazan 中桟. A generic term for the parallel crosspieces used to frame doors, windows, and other…

A timber door frame into which horizontal boards are set. The seams tsugime 継目 are hidden by crosspieces nailed in…

Also called *kirizuka 切束, komitatara 込たたら. A short strut…

Also called gararido がらり戸. The horizontal, louver boards yoroi-ita 鎧板 of a door that run parallel to each…

1　The upper horizontal timber yosegi 寄木, in a transom, called *…

Also abbreviated to yosemune 寄棟, also called yotsuyane 四つ屋根. A hipped roof. A roof that descends from the…

Also called *shia 四阿 in the Nara period. Also komune-zukuri 小棟造, …

Also ashigaki 葦垣. Also called yoshizubei 葭簀塀 or yoshizugaki 葭簀垣. A fence made of ditch reed …

The Yoshino period. A seldom-used, rather old-fashioned term for the Southern and Northern Courts period *…

A 4-stepped bracket complex found mainly on the upper part of a *tahōtō 多宝塔.…

Also called yotsuya migaki maruta 四谷磨き丸太 or migaki maruta 磨き丸太. A cedar log stripped of its bark and then…

Lit. "profound mystery." A multivalent and influential medieval aesthetic ideal expressing darkness, depth, mystery,…

Floors that have different levels. For example, the floor of the alcove *tokonoma…

The distance from the top surface of a floor to the ground below. The term can also refer to the height of a building's…

The space made by the joists *neda 根太, between the flooring of a second story and…

Short struts placed on base stones beneath a floor to support the sleepers *ōbiki…

Also called *agesage shōji 上下障子 (up and down shōji). Lit. "snow…

Also called namiranma 波欄間 (wave-patterned slats), takewaki ranma 立涌欄間 (vertical billow-patterned slats in…

Separated tail rafters supported by fulcrums which in turn support long purlins at their mid point and at each end. They are…

Also written 雨打造. A style of architecture that employs pent roof. A common 13th-19th century expression for *…