Nagaya-mon Gate is a mixture of gate and house, which is thought to have been formed and refined in the last period of 16th century. Through various changes of economic and social developing, the gate had been sequentially succeeded to later generation mainly by farmhouse in rural area. Nagaya-mon Gate contributes to local landscape and can be considered as cultural property, embodying local history and culture.
The study aims to clarify actual conditions of the gate focusing on utilization and its owner's intension to maintain, in order to obtain clue of preserving Nagaya-mon Gate. Utsunomiya city and Takanezawa town, Tochigi prefecture, were chosen for investigation because many Nagaya-mon Gates of rural type now exist in the area and these two local governments have both launched local landscape plan referred to the gate. Observation survey as well as hearing and questionnaires to the owner have been put into practice several times from 2008 to 2014.
The conclusions can be summarized as follows:
1) the greater part of Nagaya-mon Gate was built after the Meiji Restoration, while a few built during Edo period is seen;
2) general use of Nagaya-mon Gate at the present are such as storage for materials and equipment of agriculture, storehouse for foods and farm products, while a few examples such as living space, workspace and office are observed;
3) the transformation of Nagaya-mon Gate use is generally described from storage of rice paid for rent, living space for tenant farmer or war damage evacuee to storage for materials and equipment of agriculture, storehouse for foods and farm products;
4) many Nagaya-mon gates have been repaired mainly during the period of high economic growth and appearance of Nagaya-mon Gate has been drastically changed, such as roofs changed from reed roofing or stone roofing to clay tile roofing or metal sheet roofing, wall finishing also mildly changed from boarding to stone pitching;
5) owners of Nagaya-mon Gate point out that the reason of maintaining the gate is inheritance over several generations, while importance for premises and its contribution to local landscape are also heard;
6) owner of Nagaya-mon Gate complains of taxes and burden for repairing and managing on one hand and inconvenience for passing on the other;
7) in spite of the previous problems, the owners' attachment and pride of the Nagaya-mon Gate is still observed, as they conceive that Nagaya-mon Gate is the symbol of their family's history. It can be said that Nagaya-mon Gate would be maintained for the future, because facing damages by the Great East Japan Earthquake, majority of the injured gate were repaired.
