Kōdaiji Temple

This guide to Kodaiji Temple in Kyoto follows Nene, widow of the warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi, after his death in 1598 left the country's rule to a child heir she doubted could hold it. You'll hear the calculation she made instead, quietly backing her husband's rival Tokugawa Ieyasu and trading her home for a temple built in his gratitude, and about the tea master Kobori Enshu's hillside garden that came with it. Listen for the gold and black lacquerwork inside the mausoleum where she took her vows as the nun Kodai-in.