Japan Heritage story
Utsunomiya: the underground labyrinth of Oya stone
地下迷宮の秘密を探る旅
Under the hills of Oya, just outside Utsunomiya, quarrymen cut a soft pale grey stone by hand for centuries, leaving a cold, pillared labyrinth underground. Above ground, the city is built of the same stone, from shrine walls to churches.
Key facts
- Theme
- Castles, Food and sake, Mines and minerals
- Era
- Jōmon, Kofun, Heian, Edo, Meiji
- Region
- Kanto, Kansai
- Official name in Japanese
- 地下迷宮の秘密を探る旅
- Official subtitle in Japanese
- 〜大谷石文化が息づくまち宇都宮〜
- Official area (in Japanese)
- 栃木県（宇都宮市）
The story
About 15 million years ago an undersea volcano laid down thick beds of tuff at Oya, about 9 km northwest of Utsunomiya station. People lived in its caves in the Jomon period, cut tombs in the Kofun period, and in the Nara and Heian periods carved Oya Kannon, said to be Japan's oldest cliff-carved Buddha, into a rock wall.
Quarrying for building stone took off in the Edo period and boomed after Meiji, when railways carried Oya stone to Tokyo and Yokohama; at its peak, 890,000 tonnes were shipped a year. Until machines arrived in the 1950s, everything was cut by hand: about 4,000 swings of a pick for a single block of 18 x 30 x 90 cm. The roughly 250 quarries left huge underground halls, some 100 m below the surface with ceilings about 30 m high.
What to see
- Underground quarry halls: cold, pillared caverns cut entirely by hand.Google Maps 大谷資料館 (opens in a new tab)
- Oya Kannon: the Buddha carved into the cliff.Google Maps 大谷観音 (opens in a new tab)
- Stone churches: the carved Catholic Matsugamine Church and the plainer Anglican St John's Church.
- Futarayama shrine: the city's symbol, with walls of Oya stone.Google Maps 宇都宮二荒山神社 (opens in a new tab)
Plan your trip with the Tochigi prefecture guide and see more history and heritage.
Good to know
- Bring a warm layer: the air in the underground halls is cold.
- Look for Oya stone storehouses at old miso, sake and soy sauce makers, which still use them.
- Notice the stone in everyday places: garden walls, paths and paving around the city.
Questions travellers ask
What is Oya stone?
A soft tuff formed by an undersea volcano about 15 million years ago, quarried at Oya in Utsunomiya and used for buildings across the region.
How deep are the Oya quarries?
Some were dug about 100 m below the surface, with halls around 30 m high.
Where it comes from
More heritage stories from the same area
- Aizu's 33 Kannon pilgrimage: faith with a day out
- Asuka: the women who shaped the birth of Japan
- Date Masamune's dazzling culture in Sendai and Matsushima
- Gyoda: the town of tabi storehouses
- Hida no Takumi: 1,300 years of master woodworkers in Takayama
- Iga and Koka: in search of the real ninja
- Izumo: the sacred land where the sun sets
- Japan's old schools: where a nation learned to read
- Kamenose: crossing the landslide heart of the Tatsuta Kodo
- Kasamashiko: the sibling pottery towns of Kasama and Mashiko
- Katsuragi Shugen: where mountain asceticism began
- Michinoku gold: where Japan's gold story began
Local foods from the same area
Crafts from the same area
Sources
We checked the facts on this page against these sources.