, is a dormant

stratovolcano A stratovolcano, also known as a composite volcano, is a conical volcano built up by many layers (strata) of hardened lava and tephra. Unlike shield volcanoes, stratovolcanoes are characterized by a steep profile with a summit crater and per ...

Tottori Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūgoku region of Honshu. Tottori Prefecture is the least populous prefecture of Japan at 570,569 (2016) and has a geographic area of . Tottori Prefecture borders Shimane Prefecture to the west, Hirosh ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. It has an

elevation The elevation of a geographic location is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface (see Geodetic datum § Vert ...

of 1,729 metres. This mountain is the highest in the

Chūgoku region The , also known as the region, is the westernmost region of Honshū, the largest island of Japan. It consists of the prefectures of Hiroshima, Okayama, Shimane, Tottori, and Yamaguchi. In 2010, it had a population of 7,563,428. History '' ...

, and the most important volcano on the Daisen

volcanic belt A volcanic belt is a large volcanically active region. Other terms are used for smaller areas of activity, such as volcanic fields. Volcanic belts are found above zones of unusually high temperature () where magma is created by partial melting ...

, which is a part of the Southwestern Honshu volcanic arc, where the

Philippine Sea Plate The Philippine Sea Plate or the Philippine Plate is a tectonic plate comprising oceanic lithosphere that lies beneath the Philippine Sea, to the east of the Philippines. Most segments of the Philippines, including northern Luzon, are part of ...

is subducting under the

Amurian Plate The Amurian Plate (or Amur Plate; also occasionally referred to as the China Plate, not to be confused with the South China Subplate) is a minor tectonic plate in the northern and eastern hemispheres. It covers Manchuria, the Korean Peninsula, ...

Outline

Mount Daisen is a

complex volcano A complex volcano, also called a compound volcano or a volcanic complex, is a mixed landform consisting of related volcanic centers and their associated lava flows and pyroclastic rock. They may form due to changes in eruptive habit or in t ...

, made by repeated volcanic activity over thousands of years. Eruptions in this area started 1.8 million years ago and resulted in ''Old Daisen'' some 500,000 years ago. The Mount Daisen of today, ''New Daisen'', resulted from a second group of eruptions which started 50,000 years ago and ended 10,000 years ago in the caldera of Old Daisen. 50,000 years ago, this mountain had a plinian eruption from which volcanic ash can be found as far away as the Tohoku Region of Japan. Daisen is one of the 100 famous mountains in Japan, and also one of the Chūgoku 100 mountains. Daisen Volcano & Hiruzen Volcano Group Relief Map, SRTM-1

Daisen Volcano & Hiruzen Volcano Group Relief Map, SRTM-1

History and religion

Mount Daisen, which stands directly on the Sea of Japan, was regarded as one of the most important mountains for Japanese Shugendō religion. According to the '' Izumo Kokudo Fudoki'', completed in 733, it was called ''Ōkami-take'', literally, ''Mountain of the great god''. Mount Daisen has been called Hōki Fuji and Izumo Fuji, depending on which side of the mountain the viewer is standing on. These names are based on the old

Hōki was a after ''Jingo-keiun'' and before ''Ten'ō''. This period spanned the years from October 770 through January 781. The reigning emperor was . Change of era * 770 : The new era name was created to mark an event or series of events. The pr ...

and

Izumo Izumo (出雲) may refer to: Locations * Izumo Province, an old province of Japan * Izumo, Shimane, a city located in Shimane Prefecture ** Izumo Airport * Izumo-taisha, one of Japan's most ancient and important Shinto shrines Ships * ''Izumo ...

provinces.Paul Hunt, ''Hiking in Japan: An Adventurer's Guide to the Mountain Trails'', pg 73 Halfway up the mountain stands a Buddhist temple, '' Daisen-ji''. This has existed as a centre of worship since the

Heian period The is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. It followed the Nara period, beginning when the 50th emperor, Emperor Kanmu, moved the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). means "peace" in Japanese. ...

. It was founded by the

Tendai , also known as the Tendai Lotus School (天台法華宗 ''Tendai hokke shū,'' sometimes just "''hokke shū''") is a Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition (with significant esoteric elements) officially established in Japan in 806 by the Japanese m ...

sect in 718. Climbing the mountain used to be severely prohibited without a selected monk of Daisen-ji, and common people could not access the mountain until the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

. The mountain has also been important to the mountain ascetics of the

Shugendō is a highly syncretic religion, a body of ascetic practices that originated in the Nara Period of Japan having evolved during the 7th century from an amalgamation of beliefs, philosophies, doctrines and ritual systems drawn from local fol ...

sect. Just above the temple is the Ōgamiyama Jinja, literally, ''shrine of the mountain of the great god''.

Route

After the 2000 Tottori earthquake, some of Mount Daisen's peaks are on the verge of collapse. It is prohibited to ascend the mountain's highest peak, the Kengamine (). Climbers are able to access the Misen Peak (). The most popular route is from Daisen-ji to the Misen Peak. It takes three hours to reach the summit.

Gallery

File:Daisen 2016-03-21 (25887648161).jpg, NW side File:Daisen 2014-10-24 (14997796814).jpg, South wall File:Daisen 2016-03-07 (25502160362).jpg, WNW side File:Daisen highest peak.jpg, Kengamine Peak, the highest peak of Mount Daisen Mount Daisen 2015-05-03 (17214768368).jpg, Looking NW File:View of Hiruzen from Daisen Summit.JPG, Looking SSW File:The Famous Scenes of the Sixty States 41 Hoki.jpg,

Hiroshige Utagawa Hiroshige (, also ; ja, 歌川広重 ), born Andō Tokutarō (; 1797 – 12 October 1858), was a Japanese ''ukiyo-e'' artist, considered the last great master of that tradition. Hiroshige is best known for his horizontal-format l ...

References

Geographical Survey Institute
* Paul Hunt, ''Hiking in Japan: An Adventurer's Guide to the Mountain Trails'',

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.468 ...

, Kodansha International Ltd., 1988. and C0075

External links