is a

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 peri ...

in the

Nikkō National Park is a national park in the Kantō region, on the main island of Honshū in Japan. The park spreads over three prefectures: Tochigi, Gunma and Fukushima, and was established in 1934. History The establishment of Nikkō National Park dates to ...

Tochigi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Tochigi Prefecture has a population of 1,943,886 (1 June 2019) and has a geographic area of 6,408 km2 (2,474 sq mi). Tochigi Prefecture borders Fukushima Prefecture to th ...

, in central

Honshū , historically called , is the largest and most populous island of Japan. It is located south of Hokkaidō across the Tsugaru Strait, north of Shikoku across the Inland Sea, and northeast of Kyūshū across the Kanmon Straits. The island sepa ...

, the main island of

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 n ...

. The mountain is high. A prominent landmark, it can be seen on clear days from as far as Saitama, a city away. Alongside

Mount Nikkō-Shirane is a Stratovolcano in the Nikkō National Park in central Honshū, the main island of Japan. It stands at 2,578 m high. It is the highest mountain in north eastern Japan (no higher mountains exist in the east or north of this mountain). Its pe ...

, Mount Nantai is one of the newest volcanic edifices in the National Park. Scientific studies of the volcano's geological structure began in 1957 and have established that it was formed roughly 23,000 years ago and that its last eruption was 7000 years ago. The volcano was classified as active by the

Japan Meteorological Agency The , abbreviated JMA, is an agency of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. It is charged with gathering and providing results for the public in Japan that are obtained from data based on daily scientific observation an ...

in June of 2017. Since its first known ascent by

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

monk A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedic ...

Shōdō Shōnin in the 8th century AD, Mount Nantai has become a sacred mountain and a site of

pilgrimage A pilgrimage is a journey, often into an unknown or foreign place, where a person goes in search of new or expanded meaning about their self, others, nature, or a higher good, through the experience. It can lead to a personal transformation, aft ...

in Buddhism and

Shinto Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shint ...

. As such, it is currently maintained by Futarasan jinja, a Shinto shrine whose constitutes Mount Nantai. With Tōshō-gū and Rinnō-ji, the site forms the

Shrines and Temples of Nikkō The UNESCO World Heritage Site Shrines and Temples of Nikkō encompasses 103 buildings or structures and the natural setting around them. It is located in Nikkō, Tochigi Prefecture, Japan. The buildings belong to two Shinto shrines (Futarasan Shri ...

, a

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international coope ...

World Heritage Site A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for ...

Archaeological excavations In archaeology, excavation is the exposure, processing and recording of archaeological remains. An excavation site or "dig" is the area being studied. These locations range from one to several areas at a time during a project and can be condu ...

conducted here from the 19th to

20th 20 (twenty; Roman numeral XX) is the natural number following 19 and preceding 21. A group of twenty units may also be referred to as a score. In mathematics *20 is a pronic number. *20 is a tetrahedral number as 1, 4, 10, 20. *20 is the ba ...

centuries have unearthed many artifacts, dating from the end of the

Nara period The of the history of Japan covers the years from CE 710 to 794. Empress Genmei established the capital of Heijō-kyō (present-day Nara). Except for a five-year period (740–745), when the capital was briefly moved again, it remained the c ...

in the 8th century AD to 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 character ...

from the 17th to 19th centuries. A few of these have been declared Important Cultural Properties by the Japanese

Agency for Cultural Affairs The is a special body of the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). It was set up in 1968 to promote Japanese arts and culture. The agency's budget for FY 2018 rose to ¥107.7 billion. Overview The ag ...

. Mount Nantai is listed among the

100 Famous Japanese Mountains is a book written in 1964 by mountaineer and author Kyūya Fukada.Hyakumeizan, Hiking Japan!
. Japa ...

as written by

mountaineer Mountaineering or alpinism, is a set of outdoor activities that involves ascending tall mountains. Mountaineering-related activities include traditional outdoor climbing, skiing, and traversing via ferratas. Indoor climbing, sport climbing, a ...

and author Kyūya Fukada.

Toponymy

Literally, the two

kanji are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese and are still used, along with the subsequ ...

characters that make up the name, 男 and 体, mean "man" and "body" respectively, and so together the combined word 男体 means "male body". Mount Nantai is said to have been the father in a family of mountain deities in Shinto, of which the neighboring Mount Nyohō is the mother and Mount Tarō the eldest son.

Trekking

The mountain is popular with hikers, and the trail to the summit starts through a gate at Futarasan Shrine's . The gate is open between 5 May and 25 October. Mount Nantai is one of the 100 famous mountains in Japan.

Volcanic activity

In September 2008, the

was asked to reclassify Mount Nantai as "active" based upon work by Yasuo Ishizaki and colleagues of Toyama University showing evidence of an eruption approximately 7000 years ago. Nantai Volcano & Lake Chuzenji Relief Map, SRTM-1

Nantai Volcano & Lake Chuzenji Relief Map, SRTM-1

Mount Nantai as a sacred mountain

Archaeologists affirm that during the Yayoi period the most common (a '' yorishiro'' housing a ''

kami are the deities, divinities, spirits, phenomena or "holy powers", that are venerated in the Shinto religion. They can be elements of the landscape, forces of nature, or beings and the qualities that these beings express; they can also be the sp ...

'') in the earliest Shinto shrines was a nearby mountain peak supplying with its streams water, and therefore life, to the plains below where people lived. Mount Nantai constitutes Futarasan Shrine's ''go-shintai'', and the shrine is an important example of this ancient type of mountain cult. Significantly, the name itself means "man's body". The mountain not only provides water to the rice paddies below, but has the shape of the phallic stone rods found in pre-agricultural Jōmon sites.

References

External links