Rashomon takes its title from Rajōmon, the ruined southern city gate of ancient Kyoto.
Rajōmon stood at the southern end of Suzaku Avenue in Heian-kyō, the capital now known as Kyoto. Built in 789 during the Heian period, it was once a monumental entrance to the city. By the twelfth century, the gate had deteriorated and acquired an ominous reputation as a place associated with thieves, corpses, and abandoned infants.
The title became famous through Ryūnosuke Akutagawa’s short story “Rashōmon,” which uses the ruined gate as a symbol of moral and social decay. Akira Kurosawa’s 1950 film takes its title from Akutagawa’s story, although its plot also draws on another Akutagawa work, “In a Grove.”
A common mix-up is treating “Rashomon” as merely the name of Kurosawa’s narrative technique. The term became associated with conflicting accounts of the same event because of the film’s structure, but its original meaning is a place name connected to Kyoto’s historic gate.