Heijō-kyō

Listen first. Wind moves across a wide field of grass, and gravel crunches under your shoes. Far off, a train hums past, and somewhere a crow calls. It feels like an open meadow on the edge of a modern city. But you are standing inside the remains of an imperial capital, Heijō-kyō. In the eighth century, the rulers of Japan governed the whole country from this ground.

In 710, the court moved here from an earlier capital called Fujiwara-kyō. The move happened under Empress Genmei. The new city was planned on a grid, with long straight avenues crossing at right angles. Its model was Chang'an, the great capital of Tang dynasty China, which was then one of the largest cities on Earth. Japan was looking outward, and it wanted a capital that could stand beside its powerful neighbour.

The ground you see today is the Nara Palace Site. This was the heart of the larger city. It held the palace, the halls of state, and the offices of government. The palace area covered roughly one square kilometre, with an extra section on the eastern side. Beyond its walls, the city spread out in blocks of streets, temples, markets, and homes. Historians estimate that the city held a very large population for its time... perhaps around a hundred thousand people.

Turn and look south, toward the large red gate. This is the Suzaku Gate, the formal main entrance to the palace. What you see is a reconstruction, completed in the late 1990s. Through this gate ran a central avenue called Suzaku-ōji, and it was extremely wide — roughly seventy metres across. Imagine foreign envoys and officials in coloured robes walking that road toward the palace. Today, joggers and families with strollers use the same line.

Now look toward the largest building on the site. This is the Former Audience Hall, or Daigokuden. It was the most important ceremonial hall of the palace. Here the emperor appeared at the great state ceremonies, such as enthronements and New Year audiences. The building was rebuilt and completed in 2010, for the 1,300th anniversary of the capital's founding. Craftsmen used traditional joinery and large wooden pillars, and they painted the timber in deep vermilion with white walls between.

Step inside if the hall is open. In the centre stands a replica of the imperial throne, a raised platform under an elaborate canopy. Look up as well. The ceiling and the upper walls carry painted patterns and images. These include the animal guardians of the four directions, which come from Chinese tradition. The scale of the hall surprises many visitors. It was designed to make every visitor feel small before the throne.

Here is the first thing that most people miss. Almost everything above the ground here is new. The original buildings disappeared long ago. After the court left, the land slowly turned back into rice fields and farmland. For centuries, farmers worked the soil above the old foundations, and they did not know what lay beneath. The capital survived underground, in post holes, stone bases, wells, and drainage ditches.

The second surprise is the railway. Watch for a train crossing the open field. A commercial train line runs straight through the palace site. The line was in place before the full extent of the ruins was understood. So today, passengers ride across the site of an ancient government district in a few seconds. Many travellers in Nara pass through this ancient palace without ever knowing it.

Rediscovery came slowly in the modern era. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, scholars began to identify where the old palace had stood. Local people also campaigned to protect the land from development. In the twentieth century, systematic excavation began, and it still continues today. In 1998, the site became part of a UNESCO World Heritage listing called the Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara, together with the city's great temples.

Some of the most important finds here are very small. Archaeologists have recovered many thousands of thin wooden strips called mokkan. Officials wrote notes on them in ink. Some are shipping labels for taxes paid in goods, like fish, salt, or rice from distant provinces. Others are memos, records, or writing practice. Each strip is plain wood, but together they show daily life inside the government — the paperwork of an empire.

This was also a time of great culture. Historians call it the Nara period, and its high point is often called the Tenpyō era. During these decades, the court compiled Japan's oldest surviving histories, the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki. Buddhism grew strong with state support. A few kilometres east, the Great Buddha of Tōdai-ji was dedicated in 752. Poetry from this age also survives in the Man'yōshū, Japan's oldest great collection of poems.

The capital did not last long. In 784, the court moved away to a new capital at Nagaoka-kyō, and soon after it settled in Kyoto. Heijō-kyō had served as the capital for less than a century. Even so, the temples of the old city stayed. That is why Nara still holds so many ancient religious buildings, while the palace itself returned to the fields.

On the eastern side, look for the reconstructed East Palace Garden, with its winding pond and stones. Near the site, small exhibition halls show excavated objects and models of the old city. In many areas, the outlines of lost buildings are marked on the ground with low hedges, gravel, or rows of pillar bases. If you look closely, you can trace the floor plan of a hall that stood here 1,300 years ago.

Before you leave, stand still in the open field for a moment. Look from the red gate to the great hall, and then out to the hills around the Nara basin. The emperors saw those same hills. The buildings came and went, but the land stayed. As you walk away, listen again to the grass and the gravel... and remember that a capital lies quietly under your feet.