Katsura Imperial Villa

This guide to Katsura Imperial Villa in Kyoto traces Prince Toshihito, adopted as heir by the ruler Toyotomi Hideyoshi in fifteen eighty six and then quietly set aside three years later when Hideyoshi had a son of his own. It follows the poetry that consumed him afterward, especially a single line from the Tales of Genji about moonlight on the water at a village called Katsura, and the modest riverside villa he began building on that very spot once money allowed.