Chiba Prefecture holds 5,000 years of layered history: Jomon shell mounds inside the city, the Chiba clan's castle hill, Sakura's samurai quarter and Dutch-medicine school, and Sawara's canal town that produced Japan's first accurate map.
The world's largest Jomon shell midden — two joined rings of oyster and clam shell heaped up between roughly 5,000 and 3,000 years ago. Sectioned trenches and reconstructed pit dwellings are open; 9:00–17:00, closed Mondays.
Founded in 1000 CE as the tutelary shrine of the Chiba clan, dedicated to Myoken, the deified North Star that the clan carried into battle. The unusual two-storey Sonseiden hall was rebuilt in 1990 above the older stone foundations.
A 1967 concrete keep standing on the hill where Chiba Tsunetane's clan seat rose from 1126. Inside are Chiba clan armour, swords and medieval documents, with a top-floor deck over Tokyo Bay; 9:00–17:00, closed Mondays.
Chiba city's oldest temple, traditionally founded in 709 CE by the monk Gyoki and numbered 29th on the Bando Kannon pilgrimage circuit. Excavated Nara-period roof tiles and a vast ginkgo tree mark the ancient precinct.
Opened in 1983 on the grounds of Sakura Castle, this research museum runs six chronological galleries from prehistory to the postwar era, including a full-scale Edo street model. 9:30–17:00, closed Mondays.
The castle was completed around 1611 under Doi Toshikatsu and later held by the reformist Hotta lords. No keep survives, but the earthen ramparts, dry moats and gate platforms are unusually intact across the wooded plateau.
Built in 1890 for Hotta Masatomo, last lord of Sakura, this Important Cultural Property is one of very few intact Meiji-era daimyo houses, with cedar-panelled rooms and a Sakura Garden of pines. 9:30–16:30, closed Mondays.
Squat concrete arches in Chiba Park are the training viaduct of the Army Railway Regiment, stationed here from 1908 and drilled in laying and blowing up track. The regiment's rail beds became today's Chiba Monorail route.
Japan's first Important Preservation District for a merchant town: willow-lined canal banks with sake brewers, kimono dealers and plaster storehouses still trading from Edo and Meiji buildings. Sappa boat trips run from the quay.
The canal-side house and sake shop where Ino Tadataka lived until 1795, when at 49 he left for Edo to study astronomy and went on to survey the entire Japanese coastline on foot. A National Historic Site, entry free.
One of the three oldest shrines in eastern Japan, dedicated to the sword deity Futsunushi and traditionally dated to 643 BCE. The black-lacquered 1700 main hall, funded by shogun Tsunayoshi, is an Important Cultural Property.
A rebuilt version of the Edo-era irrigation aqueduct that carried water across the Ono River; every thirty minutes it releases a curtain of water into the canal, a sound registered among Japan's 100 Soundscapes.