In the Jionji district of Sakurai, a hollow zelkova leans out over the old road from a stone wall in front of the Amida Hall, beside Tamatsura Shrine. Locally it is known as the tree struck by lightning. The prefecture's sign says 800 years, the tourist association says 400, and its girth is about 6 metres. It stands in the open, free to see, and Sakurai is roughly half an hour by train from Nara.
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Saw-leaf Zelkova (Zelkova serrata) · 400-800 years · Jionji
The prefecture's sign beside this zelkova says it is 800 years old. Sakurai's tourist association says 400. Neither shows its working, and the 800 rests on tradition, so the honest answer is somewhere between the two.
Its measurements disagree almost as much. The Ministry of the Environment's giant-tree survey of April 2023 gives a height of 22 metres and a girth of 6.05 metres. Another listing has 15 metres and 6, and an older survey of the Kinki region 10 metres and 5.2. We give the girth as about 6 metres and leave the height open.
What nobody disputes is where it stands and how. It grows in front of the Amida Hall of Jionji, beside Tamatsura Shrine, rooted in a stone retaining wall and leaning out over the old road below. The trunk is hollow, and locally it is known as the tree that was struck by lightning. Nara Prefecture lists it as a protected tree, designated in October 1972 according to the listings we have seen.
It was photographed for a survey of village giants in July 2023, so it was standing then.
The tree is in the open and free to see. The nearest station named in the temple listings is Yamato-Asakura on the JR Sakurai Line, a walk away. Sakurai itself is roughly half an hour by train from Nara.
Photo: coniferconifer from japan (CC BY 2.0)