A mountain castle standing at the summit of Shiroyama at an elevation of 430 meters in Takahashi City, Okayama Prefecture, it is the highest-altitude castle with an extant original keep in Japan. One of Japan's twelve surviving original castles, it is celebrated for the fantastical view in autumn when the keep appears to float above a sea of morning clouds that fills the mountain valleys. During t…

The castle originated in 1240 when Akiba Shigenobu built a fort on Mount Gagyu. It became a battleground between the Mimura and Mori clans during the Sengoku period. The existing two-story keep dates from major renovations by Mizunoya Katsutaka in the Edo period. It is designated an Important Cultur…