The Masks at Nobusatohachimangu Shrine

The Masks at Nobusatohachimangu Shrine

Towards the end of my second day walking the Iwami Kannon Pilgrimage I was coming into the outskirts of Oda City and stopped in at the Hachimangu Shrine in Nobusato village.

One thing I am always on the lookout for at shrines are masks, and, like many village shrines in rural Japan, this one was not locked so I could go in and look around and found quite a few masks. The mask in the first photo was nice, but not unusual. The second was an unusual style that I had seen several times in the past few days and is specific to this area.

The next one was a standard Tengu mask done in Iwami kagura style, almost exactly like ones I myself have made, but the next one was back to the local style and is, I believe, a karasu tengu.

The final pair were in standar Iwami kagura style and were the old married couple, the mother and father of Kushinada Hime, the maiden rescued from the serpent Yamata Orochi by Susano.

Tengu Dakiniten Fudo Myo

Last weekend I was visiting the priest at Takuhi Shrine on Nishinoshima in the Oki Islands. I was intrigued by the print of Fudo Myo hanging in the priests house, even though this was a shrine. Upon closer examination it turned out to be quite an unusual Fudo. Standing on a white fox, it was conflated with Dakiniten, the Hindu deity quite popular with the rulers in Heian Japan, and one of the sources of Inari. It also had wings and the face of a crow, and was therefore also a Karasu Tengu.

Seeing my interest, the priest went next door and brought back this old painting which showed a more traditional long-nosed Tengu/ Yamabushi.

The shrine is located under a cliff high on the mountain, and was a temple until the Meiji Period when it "became" a shrine and therfore sparing it the destruction that happened to every other temple on the islands.

I found several smaller shrines around the mountain and the highest one was a Sanjin Shrine which the priest assured me was to Tengu.

Ensei-ji & Konpira-sha

Enseiji Temple, located down a small side street in Hagi is an example of something that was once the norm but is now unusual, it is both a temple and a shrine on the same site.

It is home to the biggest stone lantern in the prefecture as well as a huge Tengu mask. It is famous for being the temple where Ito Hirobumi, Japans first Prime Minister, studied as a child. I did hear that his uncle was a priest here.

The reason given why the shrine and temple were not forced to seperate is that they were holding writings of an imperial princess from several centuries earlier. As stated it doesnt make sense, but they were not forced to separate.

The shrine is a Konpira, a branch of the famous one on Shikoku known for protection for sea journeys. The temple part is Shingon and the honzon is a Jizo. The temple was founded in the 13th Century, a long time before the castle town was built.

Noso Hachimangu

Noso Hachimangu is the main shrine of Iizuka in Fukuoka. When I visited it was a few days before the new year and so the place was busy with people preparing for the busiest time of the year for most shrines.

The first record of the shrine, formerly known as Noso-Gu, is 1359, though legend has it that Jingu stopped here after returning from the Korean Peninsula.

There are some nice Tengu, Komainu, Zuijin etc.

As befitting a towns major shrine there are numerous subordinate shrines within the grounds, including several Ebisu shrines, a Gionsha, Tenmangu, Daijingu, Shiga, and a Sumiyoshi shrine.

The biggest secondary shrine is a Wakamitsu Inari, which will get its own post...

Shrine masks

While walking along the Shimane coast in the spring I stopped in at as many shrines as I could. One of the things I seek out at shrines are masks. many shrines will have masks on display in the main hall  to ward off evil or to attract good fortune. Sometimes they will be regular kagura masks vworn by dancers, but sometimes they will be large and non-functional as masks. This first one was an older, wooden demon mask at Kakihime Shrine in Kushiro near Masuda.

Not far away at the Hachimangu in Tsuda there were a lot of masks on display, the most intriguing being this large demon mask, also wooden and old.

Masks will often come in pairs, the left one is certainly a Karasu Tengu, which would usually be paired with a long-nosed Tengu, but I am not sure if that is what the right hand mask is.

There was also a pair of Tengu in the normal coloring and style.....

And there was a Shoki mask. Shoki, a daoist demon-queller is conflated with Susano in Japan and the two masks are often interchangeble.

Kushida Shrine

Kushida Shrine

Kushida Shrine is the most important shrine in Hakata. Founded in 757 when Hakata was the main port for official international travel and commerce. Being an urban shrine it is quite compact but there is a lot to see.

On display is a "float" from the hakata Gion Yamakasi Matsuri, one of the great festivals of Japan. 10 meters high these floats are no longer used because of overhead power lines, but during the first 2 weeks of July ten of them are put on display around Hakata.

Inside the main hall are half a dozen or so big tengu masks with particularly long noses. there are also soem nice carvings in the building itself.

The main kami is Ohatanushi, I believe the ancestral kami of one of the priestly lineages from Ise. Amataerasu and Susano are also enshrined.

There are dozens of smaller shrines in the grounds, among them Inari, Matsuo, Suwa, Konpira, Awashima, Tenmagu, and Ebisu.

There is a huge Camphor tree, said to be 1,000 years old, and 2 stone anchors which is claimed came from the invading Mongol fleet but which are in fact from Chinese merchant ships.

Masks of Shikoku

During my Shikoku Pilgrimage I actually visited far more shrines than I did temples. One of the things I was hoping to see at the shrines were masks but I was disappointed that compared to shrines in my area or in Kyushu for example there were actually very few masks. These first ones I posted before in the post on Ichibacho Hachimangu, and they remain the strangest looking masks Ive seen in Japan.

On Day 4 at a shrine in Tokushima City I found this Sarutahiko mask.

After my typhoon adventure in the mountains of Tokushima I was invited into a shrine matsuri near temple 22 Byodoji. One of the village men modelled one of the small Sarutahiko masks they had.

On the next day I reached the Tokushima coast at Yuki and found this pair of Oni at a shrine there.

2 weeks later after having walked all the way through Kochi I came across this fine pair of Tengu masks.

Tengu Hornbeam

This is the draincover for the town of Oasa in the mountains of northern Hiroshima. Its where we usually get on and off the expressway when driving long distances. I havent actually looked around or explored Oasa.

The tree is a Tengu Shide. The english name for shide is Hornbeam, and I must admit I have never heard of them. there is a good article on them here.

If you look on the right of the draincover you can see a tengu. Apparently the tengu shide is a mutation and the only place in the world it grows is around Oasa. According to the local story, if you try climbing one of these trees a tengu will appear and throw you off.

Lots of tengu blogs here

Tengu masks of Kunisaki

The oldest type of Tengu had a face that was bird-like, with a beak. Over time this became a long nose, and was probably incorporating elements of Sarutahiko, so long-nosed, red faced masks are sometimes called tengu, sometimes Sarutahiko.

The Tengu became associated with yamabushi, the ascetic monks of Shugendo. If the mask is wearing a small black cap. then I would call it a Tengu. Without a cap it might be a tengu, it might be Sarutahiko.

All of these masks were in shrines in the Kunisaki Peninsular in northern Kyushu.

The Sarutahiko mask will often be found paired with a round-faced female mask and its phallic/fertility association is clearer. The female is Uzume, Sarutahiko's wife.

More tengu masks, including some of mine, can be found here

Small Tengu mask

My latest mask, a small version of the Tengu. There are numerous renditions of Tengu, sometimes bearded, sometimes not, sometimes black hair, sometimes white. I went for a long white beard for this one.

Kagura mask index

Tengu Mask

The earliest form of Tengu in Japan was a half-bird half-man creature, the Karasu (crow) Tengu, but the commonest form is the red faced, long nosed version that has come to be associated with yamabushi, the "mountain warriors" of Shugendo. Like all the masks, it is often used to ward off evil spirits. Like all my masks, this one is for sale at a very reasonable price :).

I've only seen the Tengu mask used in one kagura dance, and I've only seen it performed once.

This wonderful carved mask is in the temple on top of the mountain on Miyajima.

Another carved wooden mask, this one was over a metre in height, so obviously not meant to be worn. It seems the mouth is made to move. It was at a shrine in Miyoshi.

The tengu with it's huge nose is an obvious phallic symbol. This was one of a pair of masks guarding a "vagina" rock at a fertility shrine on Mt. daisen.

A tengu leads the procession at Tsunozu Matsuri

Kagura mask index

Matsuri procession

The annual matsuri for a shrine will usually include a procession. The details differ a little from shrine to shrine, but the format is basically the same. This procession is being led by a Tengu, a kind of forest goblin commonly associated with yamabushi.

Next up is a Shishi, chinese lion. This was the first time I'd seen one in a procession.

The taiko is normally carried suspended from a stout piece of bamboo by 2 men, but this was pulled in a purpose-built taiko cart. I was particularly impressed with the seatbelt that the drummer is wearing.

The children's mikoshi comes next. The kids get half a day off from school for the matsuri.

Next come the larger and heavier mikoshi(s) carried by the village men, and occasionally women. Nowadays, if the village is large and the population dwindled, the mikoshi sometimes are carried by small pick-up truck.

After the mikoshi come the priests and shrine assistants, followed by the Miko who earlier danced for the kami.

Sometimes the mikoshis will stay at different spots around the village so that further ceremonies may take place.

All these photos are from the Tsunozu matsuri held in the local Otoshi shrine in the first few days of November.