Object description

Kamiyodo Haiji is a ruined Buddhist temple and national Historic Site in Yonago, Tottori Prefecture, Japan. Excavations between 1991 and 1993 uncovered temple buildings of the late Asuka period . The complex, which has an unusual plan, appears to have been destroyed by fire during the tenth or eleventh century. From the site of the kondō, hundreds of fragments of early Buddhist wall painting have been recovered. These were at the time identified as the earliest in Japan, alongside the wall paintings of the Hōryū-ji kondō. The paintings show a considerable sophistication of decoration despite the remoteness of the site, far from the political centre in the Yamato plain.