STRANGE but TRUE

There is a series of temples in Kyoto, Japan, known as

chitenjo (“blood ceilings”), where visitors can gaze upon the 400-yearold blood stains imprinted on the ceiling. They are the result of a 1598 jockeying for power, which ended with 370 warriors, holed up in Fushimi Castle, committing seppuku or ritualistic suicide when their defences were breached. When the castle was damaged in a fire in 1623, some floorboards, stained with the men’s blood, were salvaged and incorporated, mainly as ceilings, into a number of castles and temples.