The Bitter End

Art of the Edo Period

The Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaido

48. Sakashita-juku (Kameyama)

Sakashita-juku

Sakashita-juku was the forty-eighth of the fifty-three stations of the Tokaido. It is located in the present-day city of Kameyama, in Mie Prefecture, Japan.

History

Sakashita flourished as a post town during the Edo period because of its location at the entrance to the Suzuka Pass. However, the Suzuka Pass was also the reason for the post town's decline in the Meiji period; the pass was too steep for rail lines to be laid, so the rail went through Tsuge Station (present-day Iga), bypassing the formerly flourishing town.

, there are only a few private residences left at the site of the former post station, as well as very little historical architecture. The only thing that marks the former site is a stone marker built by the former town of Seki.