Five Mountain System

The Five Mountains and Ten Monasteries System (五山十刹制度 Chinese: Wushan Shicha, Japanese: Gozan Jissetsu Seido^?) system, more commonly called simply Five Mountain System, was a network of state-sponsored Zen Buddhist temples created in China during the Southern Song Dynasty (1127–1279). The term "mountain" in this context means "temple" or "monastery", and was adopted because many monasteries were built on isolated mountains. The system originated in India and was later adopted also inJapan during the late Kamakura period (1185–1333).^[1]

In Japan, the ten existing Zen Gozan temples (five in Kyoto and five in Kamakura) were both protected and controlled by the shogunate.^[1] In time, they became a sort of governmental bureaucracy that helped theAshikaga shogunate stabilize the country during the turbulent Nanboku-chō period. Below the ten Gozantemples there were ten so-called Jissetsu (十刹^?) temples, followed by another network called Shozan (諸山lit. many temples^?).^[2] The terms Gozan and Five Mountain System are used both for the ten temples at the top and for the Five Mountain System network in general, including the Jissetsu and the Shozan.

There used to be in Kamakura a parallel Five Mountain System of nunneries called Amagozan (尼五山^?), of which the famous Tōkei-ji is the only survivor.^[3]

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