HO · JAPAN

Omakase

A thoughtful reading sequence. A richer understanding of history.

Choose a menu that interests you. Follow a connected story through people, events and places, or explore freely whenever you like.

Japan History for BeginnersGet your bearings, then explore warriors, culture or the making of modern Japan.

• Japanese History: Start HereFour readings to get your bearings: the periods, the map, the people in power and the shogunates. An optional gallery of twelve lives puts faces to the story.
• Warriors, Castles and the Making of PowerBegin with Nobunaga, Hideyoshi and Ieyasu, then look inside the castle offices and households that sustained warrior rule.
• Shrines, Festivals and Everyday BeautyA tea bowl, a festival and a garden offer ways into the people and practices behind familiar images of Japanese culture.
• Across the Seas: Japan and a Changing WorldFollow scriptures, ceramics and trading ships, then an overseas mission and the reforms that reached into ordinary households.
• All introductory menus

Read a city or a placeBegin with a place and meet the people and events behind it.

• Nara: Life After the CapitalBegin at Heijō Palace and Tōdai-ji, then follow either the people who sustained the Great Buddha or the teaching brought by Ganjin. Meet again at Kōfuku-ji to see how Nara lived on after the court left.
• Kyoto: The Many Lives of an Old CapitalRead the Imperial Palace and Nijō Castle through the conflicts and decisions associated with them. Choose courtly culture or everyday religious life along the way, then reunite in a city of weavers, warfare and reinvention.
• Osaka: Castles, Credit and the TheatreBegin with Shitennō-ji and its founding tradition, then read Osaka Castle through Hideyoshi’s building and career. Continue to rice markets and theatres to discover how people made a living in the city.
• Tokyo: How Edo WorkedMove from Edo Castle to Nihonbashi to see how government, transport and everyday work sustained a vast city. Choose reconstruction after fire or Hokusai’s urban world, then return to the households that kept Edo going.
• Kamakura: What a Warrior Capital Left BehindRead a crisis of succession at Tsurugaoka Hachimangū and the memory of war at Engaku-ji. Then choose warrior law or the open-air Great Buddha to explore institutions and religious practices that outlasted political change.
• Nagasaki: What Came Through the PortMove from Dejima to Glover Garden through changing rules of trade and contact. Follow medical learning or Ryōma’s shipping and negotiations along the way, then consider who benefited from exchange and who bore its risks.
• Kobe: Old Harbours, New HorizonsBegin with the coast’s changing centres, then connect Ichi-no-tani with Yoshitsune and the naval training school with Kaishū. Choose Kiyomori’s maritime world or Minatogawa’s memorial landscape on the way.
• All city and place menus

Follow a questionExplore a question through a connected selection of people, events and places.

• Why Didn’t Unification Secure Lasting Rule?The Toyotomi and Tokugawa both rose to power, but their rule took different courses. Follow war, land grants and succession to understand why.
• How Did Temples Become Political Powers?From Tōdai-ji’s Great Buddha to Hongan-ji’s followers, discover how faith brought people, resources and political support together.
• What Did a Samurai Owe—and to Whom?Follow a warrior’s claim for a reward and a conflict between court and shogunate. Discover how family, land and a lord’s obligations shaped samurai loyalty.
• How Did Women Shape Heian Literature?Meet Teishi and Shōshi, then the writers Sei Shōnagon and Murasaki Shikibu. Discover how life at court gave women opportunities to write—and how each made her own voice heard.
• Who Made Japan’s Popular Culture?From Osaka’s theatres to Hokusai’s prints, meet the artists, publishers, performers, craftspeople and audiences who brought new work into everyday life.
• How Did a “Closed” Country Keep Learning?Follow a medical book from controlled overseas trade to the autopsy, translation and publication that made it useful to new readers.
• What Did It Take to Travel in Edo Japan?Start with the wish to make a pilgrimage, then follow the roads, obligations and checkpoints that made a long journey possible.
• Why Did Samurai Borrow from Merchants?Follow rice stipends into Edo’s markets, then compare two reforming governments to see why high status did not guarantee ready cash.
• After the Fire: How Did Edo Rebuild?From the Meireki fire to Edo Castle’s empty tower base and the town fire brigades, discover what it took to rebuild—and prepare for the next blaze.
• Who Paid for Japan’s Modernization?Follow taxes, women’s work at Tomioka, pollution at Ashio and the Factory Act to see what Japan’s growth cost ordinary households.
• All question menus