National Treasures & Important Cultural Properties
of National Institutes for Cultural Heritage, Japan

This drawing made of canvas indicates the range and area of the manor owned by Todai-ji Temple in Imizu District (Imizu-gun) of Ecchu Province (present-day northwest area of Toyama Prefecture). In the center of the horizontally oriented drawing, large-sized grids indicating the lots of land called Jori are drawn and both the developed land and waste land are indicated. Letters indicating the "Border" between manors and land other than manors are written in spots in the drawing and lines in red ink can be seen near some of the letters. Originally, the border lines in red ink should have surrounded manors. The only pictorial expressions showing geographic features consist of two lines in black ink winding their way from the upper left to the center of the drawing, with some color painted (an aeruginous pigment seems to have been used) between them, indicating a waterway. The title and gross area of the land are written to the right of the grids of Jori and the date drawn and the signature of the drawer are to the left. The letters including those in the Jori grids are stamped in red with the "Ecchu Province Seal," a total of ninety-eight times. This material is one of the Maps of the Development of Todai-ji Temple Manor, as noted in the title. The manor maps called "Maps of the Development of Todai-ji Temple Manor" indicate the manor developed by Todai-ji Temple in the Nara period, which had been kept in Todai-ji Temple for a long time, but many of them are stored at Shosoin or the Imperial Repository as treasures. Some were handed down to private citizens and six maps including this one are known at present.