Spiral Hall, Five Hundred Rakan Temple, No. 66 from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo

The balcony depicted here, some thirty feet above the ground in a flat expanse of the delta area of eastern Edo, was famous for its panoramic view. The vista was the finishing touch to an unusual journey that visitors took through the building: a three-story passage through three separate pilgrimage circuits, each a replication of a famous Buddhist pilgrimage in Japan. Called Sansōdō, or Three-Circuit Hall, the structure was popularly known as Sazaedō or Spiral Hall, after a shellfish with a spiral shell. The hall was part of the complex known as the Five Hundred Rakan Temple. Two buildings containing more than five hundred images of rakan, or disciples of the Buddha, flanked the main hall of the temple, out of sight to the right.