Bell of Time: Following the echoes of ancient Edo

The belltower was erected on the site in 1666. At the time, the entirety of Ueno hill was considered part of Toeizan Kaneiji temple's precincts. Even today, the belltower belongs to the temple. It is said that there were more than ten similar belltowers throughout the city, radiating out around Edo Castle, from Ueno to Asakusa, Shiba, and Mejiro. Like a game of telephone, the bells would ring out in succession, after receiving a signal from Edo Castle. Back in the days before watches, the townspeople would tell the time by the number of bells sounded, according to the old lunar calendar.

For the people of Edo, the bell was a familiar part of life and the aural landscape. Poet Matsuo Basho captured the rhythms of quotidian city life with the verse:


Blossoming clouds and

bells ring out in Ueno
...or Asakusa?

One can imagine Basho sitting in his hermitage in Fukagawa, the sky filled with billowy clouds of sakura in full bloom, when the sound of a distant bell drifted in his window, inspiring him to put brush to paper. The verse speaks to the idyllic passage of time in the peaceful Edo period.

Apart from a few short interruptions during the Meiji era and the Second World War, the task of sounding the bell has been handed down through the generations. True to tradition, the bell is rung three times, as a cue to alert townspeople to begin counting. The bell is rung a further six times at 6:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m., and 12 times at noon. In June 1996, the sound of the bell was selected as one of the Ministry of the Environment’s “100 Soundscapes of Japan,” for the integral part it plays in the fabric of everyday life in Ueno.

A short walk from the hustle and bustle of Ueno Station, Ueno Park is an uncommon oasis of calm and quietude in the heart of the city. Stepping into the park is akin to stepping back in time to an analog world. It’s said that, when the city is still asleep, the sound of the morning bell travels all the way to Uguisudani Station and Uenosakuragi. As the cityscape continues to evolve, it will do so to the rhythm of this ancient bell, a familiar friend to the locals and a beacon beckoning all visitors to Ueno.