祇園の櫻

About this photo

This photograph seems to show the great weeping cherry tree in Maruyama Park, in Higashiyama Ward, Kyoto. It appears in Kyoto Meisho (Famous Sights of Kyoto), published in 1907 (Meiji 40). In the foreground, a large crowd has gathered to view the blossoms. If this is the Maruyama Park cherry, the tree shown is the first one, the parent of today's tree.

Maruyama Park was land that had belonged to Yasaka Shrine and nearby temples. The government took it over in the early Meiji era, and it opened as a park in the mid-Meiji era. At the time of the photograph it was a lively place lined with rental banquet rooms. The garden with its pond that you see today was made in the early Taisho era by Ogawa Jihei. The weeping cherry is a variety called hitoe shiro higan shidarezakura, a single-flowered white weeping cherry. The first tree was said to be more than 200 years old and was designated a Natural Monument, but it died in 1947.

Today's tree is the second generation, grown by the landscape gardener Sano Toemon from seeds of the first tree and planted in 1949. Known as the "night cherry of Gion," it is still loved as one of Kyoto's famous places for cherry blossoms.

Glossary