Japan · Fukuoka Prefecture · Fukuoka
Gokushomachi, Fukuoka — Area Guide & Where to Stay
Gokushomachi is a district of Hakata ward in Fukuoka named for having prepared the offerings for the Hakozaki Hachimangu, and known as the temple town.
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Where to stay in Gokushomachi
Where visitors usually base themselves, and why.
Temples are what fill this district. Gokusho is called a teramachi because so many of them stand within its eighteen hectares, and the ground around Shofuku-ji is protected as a special green conservation area. War damage passed it by.
The bombing of 1945 spared the district, so the old temples and the street pattern around them are still there. Hakata station lies a short walk south-east.
About Gokushomachi
What are the main landmarks in Gokushomachi?
Shofuku-ji is the first Zen temple in Japan. Eisai opened it after returning from Song China, and it served as the country's window on the continent, accumulating the practice of dealing with foreign visitors that later diplomacy was built on. Tea came the same way.
Eisai is remembered for bringing tea back from China, and the spread of tea culture in Japan owes a great deal to him. Jotenji began a festival. The Hakata Gion Yamakasa is said to have started at that temple, which is what most visitors come to Gokusho knowing.
What is the history of Gokushomachi?
The name records an offering. Kaibara Ekiken's continued gazetteer of Chikuzen says the place was called Gokusho because the offerings for the Hakozaki Hachimangu were prepared here. Hakata organised itself in flows.
In the Edo period Gokushomachi was one of the towns of Hakata and belonged to the Higashimachi-nagare, having been part of Naka district in Chikuzen province in the Sengoku period. Administration changed three times. The district went to Fukuoka ward in 1878, to Fukuoka city in 1889 and to Hakata ward in 1972.
Boundaries were tidied in 1966. Part of Gokushomachi went to Kamigofukumachi that year, and parts of eleven other towns came in, which is how the present single-name district was formed.
Where is Gokushomachi?
Gokushomachi lies in the north-west of Hakata ward in Fukuoka, about one and a half kilometres east-north-east of Tenjin, bounded by the Mikasa river to the north-east, national route 202 to the south-east and the Taihaku-dori to the south-west.
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Updated September 2026