Present time Bancho was the area where many Hatamoto, direct retainers of the Tokugawa shogun, used to live as guards in the case. The area between the inner and outer moats of Edo Castle, present time Imperial Palace, was allocated to Shinpan (the relative daimyo families of the shogun), and Fudai (the old and trustworthy daimyo families of the shogun) for the shoguns living inside the inner moats. In the western part of the castle in particular, which is most important area against the possible attack by the powerful western daimyo, many Hatamoto families were ordered to live to protect the shogun in case. This area was present time Bancho. There were many big houses of Hatamoto which were thickly covered with garden trees in those years, so it looked dismal even in daytime and quite dark in the night. That’s why famous horror stories such as Bancho-sarayashiki and Yoshida-goten were written setting in Bancho. Present time Bancho has turned into a high-end residential area.
Because of the expensive land price, no houses but condos here. The photo shows a street in the area named Bancho-bunjin-dori, along which Japan’s first-class writers and artists lived before the Second World War. They were Fujita Tsuguji (painter), Shimazaki Toson (writer), Izumi Kyoka (writer), Arishima Takeo (writer), Kikuchi Kan (writer), Yosano Akiko (poetess), Ichikawa Utaemon (actor) and the like.
Jason Hardy
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