Shitennoji

Prince Shotoku founded this temple in 593, which makes it the oldest state-built Buddhist institution in Japan. The story goes that he vowed to build it if the pro-Buddhist Soga clan won their war against the Mononobe, and he named it for the Four Heavenly Kings who guard the cardinal directions.

The central compound arranges its gate, five-storey pagoda, main hall and lecture hall in a single straight line running south to north. That layout is now called Shitennoji-style, and temple builders copied it for centuries. What stands today is a 1963 concrete reconstruction, faithful to the original proportions but obviously modern up close. The temple has burned or fallen down at least seven times, most recently in the 1945 air raids, and the concrete was a decision to stop rebuilding it in wood. You can climb the pagoda's internal stairs, which is unusual and worth doing.

The stone torii at the western gate dates from 1294 and is the odd thing here: a Shinto gate at a Buddhist temple, aligned so the sun sets directly through it. At the spring and autumn equinoxes people gather to watch, a meditation practice called nissokan in which the setting sun stands in for the Pure Land in the west.

Grounds are free. The central compound, the Gokuraku-jodo garden and the treasure house each cost a few hundred yen and can be skipped if time is short. The garden is a quiet, well-kept pond garden and almost always empty. Kame no Ike, the turtle pond in the free area, is not empty at all, it holds a large and unbothered population of turtles stacked on every rock.

Come on the 21st or 22nd of the month if you can. Those days bring a flea market across the grounds, hundreds of stalls of old kimono, tools, ceramics and junk, and the temple fills with the kind of crowd that is there for the bargaining rather than the buildings. It is a twelve-minute walk from Tennoji Station, or two minutes from Shitennoji-mae Yuhigaoka on the Tanimachi subway line.