Founded in 778 by Sakanoue no Tamuramaro, Kiyomizu-dera is an independent Buddhist temple in eastern Kyoto. The temple is part of the Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto and a UNESCO World Heritage site. How long would this temple last in a life after people, where is no one to come and worship?
1 day[]
As power outages spread across the globe, the temple is plunged into natural darkness for the first time since 778.
1 year[]
The wooden supports that kept the building up for all these years have begun to rot, as the time it had spent without maintenance has begun to take its toll.
45 years[]
As the temple is a wooden structure, one would expect it to have a very short lifespan. In fact, it would've continued to endure for five more years if an earthquake hadn't ended its life early. As an 8.6 earthquake ravages eastern Kyoto, the wooden supports keeping the main temple up fail, causing the temple to tumble down the very hill it was built on. As this happens, the pagoda, torii, and niomon collapse almost simultaneously.