No visitor to Kamakura, or even to Tokyo, should miss this Great Buddha. Housed in the temple Kōtoku-in (高徳院), it is a popular destination and so easy to reach on foot or by bus. Most maps of Kamakura depict the Daibutsu visually, so you need not read Japanese to find your way.
Cast in 1252, this Buddha was originally housed in a wooden temple. Notably, it was built completely with donations - no government funding whatsoever. A 1498 tsunami destroyed this building, and crushed hundreds of Samurai who were taking refuge inside, but left the huge bronze statue standing. Some repairs were done in 1960, particularly to strengthen the statue's neck, but otherwise it has been standing out in the open, in it's present form, for more than five hundred years.
The statue is made primarily of copper, with a large component of lead and tin. Even today we are not one hundred percent sure how it was put together. Originally the statue was covered in brilliant, shining gilt, but over the course of 700 years it has worn almost completely off. Specialists have said that that statue's balance, intelligence, powerfulness, and dignity surpass that of the Todaiji Buddha in Nara.
Among those impressed by the statue's longevity and serene demeanor are Richard Cocks, who after visiting in 1616 said that the Daibutsu must be larger than the Colossus of Rhodes, and Rudyard Kipling, who, after seeing the Daibutsu in 1892, mentions it repeatedly in verses throughout his novel Kim.
By Tophet-flare to Judgment Day,
Be gentle when "the heathen" pray
To Buddha at Kamakura!
If you go around to the back, you can see that this Buddha in fact has windows! It is hollow inside and in fact for a time it was a den for gamblers and the homeless.
Now you can go inside for only 20¥ - about 20 cents.
Mentioned in: Japan's Daibutsu
Sources:
http://themargins.net/anth/19thc/kipling.html
http://www.kamakuratoday.com/e/sightseeing/daibutsu.html
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