By appearance one of Japan's more unusual castles, the present-day Utsunomiya-jō is a partial reconstruction (2007) consisting of a pair of turrets and wall along a stretch of moat. The castle's foundation dates to a Kamakura-era fortress established by the Fujiwara family in 1062. Closely tied to the Tokugawa Shogunate during the Edo era, Utsunomiya-jō saw major conflict during the Boshin War as a stronghold of old regime loyalists and was burned to the ground.