Murotsu, penetrates deep into the land, is an ancient good port that described in Harimanokuni Fudoki (the Topographical Records of Harima Province) as “it’s like a room in preventing wind.” and Taira-no-Kiyomori also called Murotsu Port in the middle ages. In the Edo period, most daimyo used Murotsu during the daimyo’s alternate-year residence system. Therefore, there were six headquarters in Murotsu. And it was an international port where a group of the curator of the Dutch trading house, the Korean Emissary and envoys dispatched from The Ryukyu Kingdom dropped in. At the tip of the cape that protects against the wind, there is the Kamo Shrine, where the main shrines of national important cultural properties line up, and there are the pillars of the Himeji clan’s “Minatoguchi Banshoato” below the shrine. It is a prosperous port in Kitamae-bune trade, which was full of lively cargo ship activities as far as Hokkaido.
ports of call
Cultural Properties of Murotsu, Tatsuno City
Murotsu Museum of Sea Port
A house of a small-cargo vessel wholesaler, Hanshiro Miki (Shimaya) who made a fortune through Kitamae-bune.
Moyai stone
The stone that connected the mooring of the ship when Kitamae-bune arrived at Murotsu.
Stone buddhiest
A stone buddhiest at the thirty-three holy places in Saigoku (western Japan), that Miki Hanshiro, a small-cargo vessel wholesaler who made a fortune through Kitamae-bune, dedicated to an ancient temple the Kenshoji Temple.
Hiyoriyama
The place where the sailors of Kitamae-bune forecasted the weather before departure.
Townscape of Murotsu
The townscape of Murotsu telling the state of the time that prospered because of Kitamae-bune business.
