A new Japanese hotel is offering travelers a first-of-its-kind experience – to live like a medieval lord in a real castle keep. Ozu Castle in Ehime prefecture’s Ozu town is the first and only castle ...

Atop a small mountain on the Higashi Matsuura Peninsula northwest of Karatsu City, the ruins of a castle built more than four centuries ago look out over the Genkai Sea toward Korea. Image: Vicki L ...

During Japan’s Sengoku “Warring States” era (1467-1615), castles were constructed, bolstered and fortified all across the Japanese archipelago, resulting in approximately 5,000 individual keeps.