Ueno Park is famous for cherry blossom viewing, but after the cherry blossom season, now is time for tree peony and herbaceous peony. At peony garden in Tosho-gu, we can enjoy both peonies, late-blooming tree peony and early-blooming herbaceous peony right now.

Ueno Tosho-gu, now in Ueno Park, used be in the vast precincts of Toeizan Kan’eiji Temple during the Edo period, when it was a Shinto and Buddhist syncretism. It was a place visited by many Edo people who was not able to visit Nikko Tosho-gu.

This peony garden is located in precincts of Tosho-gu. Both tree peony and herbaceous peony are native to China and belong to the same genus, Paeonia, and have been been loved and treated as precious in Japan and China for a long time due to the beauty of flowers and medicinal properties of their plants.

In Japan, we have a proverb expressing beautiful woman; standing like shakuyaku: herbaceous peony and sitting like botan: tree peony. It is said that the figure of a herbaceous peony that blooms straight up is likened to a beautiful standing lady, and the figure of a tree peony that blooms sideways in a low place is likened to a lovely sitting lady.

Please watch my YouTube video, you can identify defference between Shakuyaku, herbaceous peony and Botan, tree peony.