Akiba Shrine, Nishigamo, Kyoto.

In the foothills of NW Kyoto City stands Kyoto Golf Club. Bisecting the convoluted course is a narrow valley reached by a small road that passes Shakuhachi Pond. After passing under the bridge traversed by the golf carts one comes to Akiba Shrine. Enshrined here is one of the Fire Protection deities. There are many Akiba Shrines scattered throughout Japan, the original shrine is in Shizuoka, and the Akiba cult was spread by Yamabushi, the mountain warrior monks of the shugendo religion.

The shrine is in a state of poor repair, and seems abandoned, but on closer inspection one sees that the altars in front of the small hondens have fresh offerings placed upon them.

There is also a small Inari shrine, also with fresh offerings. Probably no priests visit the shrine. Akiba (sometimes pronounced Akiha) is classified as a "folk" kami, which basically means its very popular but has nothing to do with the Imperial kami that State Shinto is based on.

Further evidence of the Shugendo connection is the small altar to Fudo Myojin, a Buddhist deity of Indian origin that was particularly revered by followers of Shugendo. The altar is at a water purification spot, the channel above brings ice-cold mountain water which falls onto the yamabushi in a form of water purification. Shugendo was outlawed by the Meiji government in their drive to create the national State religion of Shinto. It became legal again after 1945, but is now just a pale imitation of what it was.

A walk along the Yato River

The Yato River starts at about 900metres up in the mountains of the Mizuho Highlands, right where there is a small ski area. It then travels 30K until it reaches the Gonokawa River and enters it on the opposite bank to my village. One of the first walks I took when I moved to this area was along the Yato, hoping to reach the source in one day. Walking upriver I passed through Kawado, Oda, and Ichiyama. After Ichiyama the river does a couple of S-bends, and on the outside curves it is deep and still (above photo).

Next comes the small village of Yato, and a short distance after that Yato Dam. At 44metres in height, its not a huge dam. Built in 1958 its main purpose was to stop flooding downstream. It also supplies drinking water to the villages downstream and generates some hydroelectric power. Behind the dam the artificial lake stretches like 2 narrow, windy, crooked fingers. It's called Sakurai Lake as the Yato river valley has been known as Sakarai-go since the 8th Century. It's a great place to walk as the road has no traffic and the banks of the lake are uninhabited. In the winter thousands of ducks come from Siberia and settle on the lake.

As I got closer to where the "lake" ends and it becomes a river again the light of the low winter sun came streaming across and through the forest illuminating a scene of glorious fall colors. After passing through a small, sleepy village I reached a main road, and in a few kilometres it and the river turned 90 degrees and went along a long straight valley. High up in the mountains running parallel to the river runs the Hamada Expressway whose concrete purpose seems to be to bring hordes of tourists from the urban conglomeration around Hiroshima to the fine, sandy beaches of Shimane in the summer.

In the town of Ichiki stands a curiosity. A small temple lies literally underneath the expressway, and on one of the massive concrete towers that support the expressway is a relief of a giant cedar tree. Before the expressway was built there stood a giant cedar tree in the grounds of the temple. Often at shrines, and sometimes at temples one can still find these ancient giant trees, many more than 1,000 years old. This particular beauty stood directly in the path of the intended expressway, so was chopped down and memorialized in concrete. Somehow poignant and ironic.

I only made it a few more kilometres before the river turned up the mountain and became much steeper. The day was getting late, and my tired legs did not relish a steep climb, so I ended short of my hoped for destination.
One sight I saw a lot on this and most other walks I make around the countryside is abandoned houses. One often reads that Japan is a small, overcrowded country, and thats why most people live in very small concrete boxes, but that is a bit of a lie. The cities are very crowded, and most Japanese live in cities now, but the countryside is filled with thousands and thousands of big, empty houses. Problem is no-one wants to live in the countryside. Whereas in Europe and the U.S. many people want to escape the cities and live in the countryside, but can't afford to, the Japanese countryside continues to depopulate. People seem to WANT to live in the cities.

Enduring Identities. A review.

Enduring Identities: The guise of Shinto in contemporary Japan.

John K. Nelson

University of Hawaii Press

ISBN: 0-8248-2259-5

324 pp

The Japanese religion known today as Shinto remains little understood by many visitors to Japan, and even by many Japanese. The most often used description of it as "the ancient religion of Japan" is simply inaccurate and misleading.

For anyone seeking to understand Shinto, Enduring Identities is a great place to start.

John Nelson spent a year at Kyoto's Kamigamo Jinja, one of the major shrines in the Kyoto area, and the fieldwork and interviews he did there explore the forms that Shinto takes today.

Kamigamo Jinja pre-dates Kyoto, and the book contains a lot of interesting history of the area that one normally doesn't find in the standard tourist literature, and particularly interesting is the information on the area being primarily settled by immigrants from what is now the Korean peninsular.

By interviewing many of the visitors to the shrine, as well as the parishioners, and the staff and priests, Nelson builds up a description of what Shinto is and means that is far more diverse than, and sometimes contradictory to, the commonly heard cliches. He also does an excellent job of presenting the relationship between contemporary Shinto and State Shinto, the nationalistic, militaristic cult that held sway in Japan for the first half of the twentieth century. Anyone interested in the Yasukuni Shrine issue will find it informative.

There is an interesting chapter on the "sacred space" of the shrine that is useful and relevant to an understanding of how such concepts manifest themselves in many areas of Japanese life, not just shrines and temples.

The longest chapter concerns itself with the annual cycle of rituals and ceremonies that take place at the shrine. Being both very old (7th century), and important, Kamigamo is home to some major ceremonies, most notably what is commonly called the Aoi Festival, and also the lesser-known Crow Sumo, but the information is also relevant to an understanding of Shinto rituals in general.

A book that would be rewarding to anyone interested in Kyoto or contemporary Japanese cultural anthropology as well as Shinto and Japanese religion.

this review originally published on JapanVisitor

Blue Hanya mask.

This is one of my original Iwami Kagura masks. I've never seen a blue hanya, and no-one I know has either, but I was wanting the feel of the wicked witch of the north/Ice Queen. White hair is not unheard of, but it is not common. I chose straight horns, which are rarely used anymore, but were more common when the masks were made of wood. Lastly I lengthened and added a bunch more teeth.

Red Hanya
Regular Hanya

Iwami Kagura photos

Taishogun Shrine, Nishigamo, Kyoto

Taishogun is short for Sei-Taishogun, which translates liberally as "barbarian fighting generalissimo", known more commonly as Shogun. Taishogun shrines, however, have nothing to do with the earthly shoguns, rather it refers to a group of kami that offer protection from the different directions. There are 4 Taishogun shrines in Kyoto, one each for the 4 directions, and this one is for protection from the north.
The shrine here was originally established by the local villagers who were rooftile makers. Taking into consideration that rooftile technology was imported from the Korean peninsular, and that this area, the Kyoto basin previously known as Yamashiro, was settled by immigrants from Korea, its a safe bet that this was a Korean shrine. The ruins of the old kilns are said to be still nearby.

Once Kyoto was established at the end of the 8th Century, it became a Taishogun shrine as Chinese geomancy was very much in favor at that time. The main kami is said to be Susano, specifically the Susano of Yasaka Shrine in Gion, and originally the kami of Yasaka was Gozu Tenno, a Korean god who later came to be equated with Susano.

Due to its location near Kamigamo Shrine, there are tatesuna sandcones in front to the hondens.

Dawn over the Gonokawa

I live on the banks of the Gonokawa River, the longest river in Western Japan, and yet it's less than 200K in length. Geologically speaking it's a very young river, not yet having had time to create an estuary. Like all Japanese rivers it is now dammed and a lot tamer than it used to be. The river was sometimes navigable all the way upstream into Hiroshima Prefecture, and that was the route the silver from Iwami Ginzan was shipped out. My village, Shimonohara, is about 18 K upstream from where the river enters the Japan Sea at Gotsu. These photos were taken from almost the same spot about 1K upstream of where I live. The top photo was taken in November.

This one was taken in May.

This one was June

And this one was January.

Nishigamo Mura-sha

After leaving Kamigamo shrine I set off t0 explore the foothills of the edge of the city to the west of Kamigamo in Nishigamo. On my walks I hope to discover the little-known "folk" shrines that were the norm in traditional Japan before the creation of State Shinto in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. Sure enough, I found one at the top of one of the villages in the area. This one is called Mura-sha, which simply means "Village Shrine". It had this wonderful natural wood torii.

Due no doubt to its proximity to Kamigamo Shrine, the hondens at the rear each had a pair of tatesuna, but unlike any other tatesuna I've seen, these each had a stone protruding from the top. I havent been able to find out what these stones represent, but my guess is that they represent Iwakura , (stone seat), which are rock outcroppings usually on the top of mountains where the Kami descend to earth.

Tsuwano Koi (carp)

This manhole cover is from Tsuwano, a small castle town in the mountains of western Iwami. It's a very popular tourist destination, and one of the things it is known for is its canals and ditches filled with colorful koi (carp). The town only has about 5,000 inhabitants, and they are outnumbered by the carp. They (the carp, not the inhabitants :)) were kept in the canals to serve as an emergency food supply in times of famine or siege.

For more photos of Japanese manhole covers click here For more photos of Tsuwano click here

Kamigamo Shrine

Kamigamo Shrine is situated in a quiet residential area in the north of Kyoto, and is a little off the main tourist routes and therefore often less-crowded than shrines in the city centre, though no less impressive.
The shrine is a designated World Heritage site, and most of the shrine buildings are classified as Important Cultural Properties.
Established in the 7^th Century, a hundred years before Kyoto (Heiankyo) was founded, it is nevertheless about one hundred years younger than its sister shrine, Shimogamo Shrine.
Both shrines were built by the powerful Kamo family who moved to this area from Yamato (Nara) probably to control this outlying area of mainly immigrants from the Korean Peninsula.
When the Imperial capital moved to Heiankyo (present day Kyoto) the Kamo shrines enjoyed imperial patronage and support that has continued to the present.
Kamo Sai, the correct name for Aoi Matsuri, one of the 3 major festivals of Kyoto, ends here after beginning in the Imperial Palace and passing through Shimogamo Shrine.
One approaches the shrine across a large open space that is lawn, rather than the more usual gravel, and this gives it the feel of a park.

The most unusual thing about the shrine is the 2 large sand cones that flank the entrance to the main shrine building. Known as Tatesuna, opinion differs as to their original meaning, but the most commonly accepted is that they represent the sacred mountain just to the north of the shrine. Small cones of salt outside restaurant entrances are said to derive from the Tatesuna. Many of the smaller, local shrines in this part of Kyoto also have the tatesuna.

The sacred mountain is Koyama, about 2K to the north, and it is believed that the shrine was originally built much closer to it. Interestingly, Koyama is a Kannabiji, a sacred mountain where the kami resides inside it, rather than the more usual situation of a mountain that the Kami sometimes descends onto. Kannabi seems to be a concept from Izumo, and the original home shrine of the Kamo clan is at the base of Mt. Katsuragi between Osaka and Nara, and it is also a kannabiji with an Izumo kami, so there might be a connection between the Kamo and ancient Izumo.

On September 9^th the shrine holds the Crow Sumo ceremony, where young boys from the neighborhood compete at sumo to entertain the gods. Before the sumo, shrine priests perform rituals while emulating the call and movements of crows, hence the name.
Entrance to the shrine is free, but at 9:30 most mornings there is a short tour of the shrine including a purification ritual for which a 500yen “donation” is asked.
With advance notice, groups can book a tour of the shrine with a lecture in English, plus view some of the shrines treasures not normally open to the public.
Kamigamo Shrine can be reached by Kyoto Bus numbers 30, 32, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, and 39, or Kyoto City Bus numbers 4, 46, and 67.

See more photos of Kamigamo here
Review of a book on Kamigamo here

Iwami Kagura video

I've been experimenting with different ways of putting videos on the blog, and so far embedding youtube seems to be the best.



This video was shot last November in Oihikonomikoto Shrine, down the river from my village in Oda village, matsukawa-cho. It was at the annual matsuri. The dance is Kurazuka, and later in the dance the dancer becomes a fox. Kurazuka is an interesting dance because every kagura group does a different version,and usually there is some improvisation. All dancers in Iwami Kagura are male.

See lots of Iwami Kagura photos HERE