World Heritage Quiz | Beginner Cultural and Natural Sites in Japan

The Hōryū-ji area preserves some of the oldest wooden buildings in the world and shows how Chinese Buddhist architecture and temple layouts were adapted to Japanese culture. It is a separate inscription from Ancient Nara.

Himeji Castle is the outstanding example of the early 17th-century Japanese castle, combining the beauty of wooden architecture with a sophisticated defensive system. It was not inscribed for its white exterior alone.

Shirakami-Sanchi is known for the large-scale virgin beech forest remaining in East Asia. Its representative vegetation differs from Yakushima, which includes ancient cedars.

Yakushima shows a vertical distribution of vegetation corresponding to its range of altitude, together with temperate rainforest including ancient cedars. That differs from the Ogasawara Islands, where the focus is speciation on oceanic islands.

The Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto include, besides Kyoto City and Uji, the Enryaku-ji temple in Ōtsu, Shiga Prefecture. The inscription does not fall within Kyoto City alone.

The gasshō-zukuri houses of Shirakawa-gō and Gokayama shed snow easily from their steep roofs, adapting to heavy snowfall. The attics were also used for silkworm raising and other work.

The Genbaku Dome is preserved as physical evidence of the bombing and stands as a symbol of the call for the abolition of nuclear weapons and for lasting peace. It is not preserved for architectural beauty alone.

At Itsukushima Shrine, sea, mountain and shrine form a single landscape expressing the Japanese view of nature and Shinto architecture. The inscription is not of the great torii gate alone.

The Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara concern the 8th-century capital Heijō-kyō and show the formation of the state and Buddhist culture. The Hōryū-ji area is nearby but a separate inscription.

The Shrines and Temples of Nikkō are a group of buildings centered on Tōshōgū, Futarasan Shrine and Rinnō-ji. The inscription does not refer to Tōshōgū alone.

The Gusuku Sites and Related Properties convey the distinctive culture of the Ryūkyū Kingdom and its exchanges linking Japan, China and Southeast Asia. They are not a group of Sengoku castles on the Japanese mainland.

The property in the Kii Mountain Range comprises Yoshino and Ōmine, Kumano Sanzan and Kōyasan, together with the pilgrimage routes linking them. The fusion of nature worship and Buddhism is central.

At Shiretoko a marine ecosystem sustained by drift ice is closely linked with the terrestrial one. It is not a site evaluated for its forest in isolation.

Iwami Ginzan includes not only the points of extraction but smelting, habitation, transport routes and the shipping port, conveying the landscape of the entire silver production system.

The temples and gardens of Hiraizumi fused Pure Land Buddhist thought with the Japanese view of nature and with Shinto, expressing the Buddhist Pure Land as landscape. Their purpose differs from the karesansui gardens of Zen.

The Ogasawara Islands are oceanic islands formed by submarine volcanic activity, never joined to a continent, where distinctive speciation proceeded. They differ from continental islands separated from a landmass.

Mount Fuji was inscribed for the cultural value of a long-standing object of worship that influenced art such as ukiyo-e. It is not inscribed as a natural site.

The Tomioka Silk Mill and related sites show the innovation in raw silk production and sericulture technology brought by the introduction of French technology. They are not facilities for cotton spinning or ironmaking.

The Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution are a serial property showing the development of iron and steel, shipbuilding and the coal industry. The industrial field differs from that of the Tomioka Silk Mill.

The Jōmon sites show people living settled before an agricultural society, developing hunting, gathering and fishing along with a spiritual culture. They are not a group of royal tombs of the Kofun period.