is a

Shinto shrine A is a structure whose main purpose is to house ("enshrine") one or more ''kami'', the deities of the Shinto religion. Overview Structurally, a Shinto shrine typically comprises several buildings. The '' honden''Also called (本殿, meani ...

in the Yamamoto neighborhood of the city of Suzuka in

Mie Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Mie Prefecture has a population of 1,781,948 () and has a geographic area of . Mie Prefecture is bordered by Gifu Prefecture to the north, Shiga Prefecture and Kyoto Prefecture to ...

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 is one of the two shrines which claim the title of ''

ichinomiya is a Japanese historical term referring to the Shinto shrines with the highest rank in a province. Shrines of lower rank were designated , , , and so forth. ''Encyclopedia of Shinto'' ''Ichi no miya'' retrieved 2013-5-14. The term gave rise t ...

'' of former

Ise Province was a province of Japan in the area of Japan that is today includes most of modern Mie Prefecture. Ise bordered on Iga, Kii, Mino, Ōmi, Owari, Shima, and Yamato Provinces. Its abbreviated form name was . History The name of Ise appears ...

. The main festival of the shrine is held annually on October 11.

Enshrined ''kami''

The ''

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 ...

'' enshrined at Tsubaki Grand Shrine are: * , leader of the '' kunitsukami'' and patron of martial arts such as

aikido Aikido ( , , , ) is a modern Japanese martial art that is split into many different styles, including Iwama Ryu, Iwama Shin Shin Aiki Shuren Kai, Shodokan Aikido, Yoshinkan, Renshinkai, Aikikai and Ki Aikido. Aikido is now practiced in around 1 ...

. * , grandson of

Amaterasu Amaterasu, also known as Amaterasu Ōmikami () or Ōhirume no Muchi no Kami (), is the goddess of the sun in Japanese mythology. One of the major deities (''kami'') of Shinto, she is also portrayed in Japan's earliest literary texts, the ''Kojik ...

and great-grandfather

Emperor Jimmu was the legendary first emperor of Japan according to the '' Nihon Shoki'' and '' Kojiki''. His ascension is traditionally dated as 660 BC.Kelly, Charles F"Kofun Culture"Emperor Suinin , also known as was the 11th legendary Emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. Less is known about ''Suinin'' than his father, and likewise he is also considered to be a "legendary emperor". Both the ''Kojiki'', and t ...

by the order of Princess Yamato on the site of the grave of Sarutahiko. It first appears in historical documentation in an entry dated 748 in the records of

Daian-ji was founded during the Asuka period and is one of the Seven Great Temples of Nara, Japan. History The Nihon Shoki records the founding of the , predecessor of the Daian-ji, in 639 during the reign of Emperor Jomei. A nine-story pagoda was ...

Nara The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an " independent federal agency of the United States government within the executive branch", charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It i ...

. It is listed as a major shrine in the ''

Engishiki The is a Japanese book about laws and customs. The major part of the writing was completed in 927. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Engi-shiki''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia'', p. 178. History In 905, Emperor Daigo ordered the compilation of the ...

'' records from the early

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. ...

, and was regarded as the ''

'' of the province from this time, although this is contested by Tsubaki Jinja, (also in Suzuka), which claims that it is the shrine listed in the ''Engishiki''. Further according to the shrine's legend, a descendant of Sarutahiko, Gyōman Daimyōjin, was the founder of

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 ...

and this the shrine was a center of the Shugendō religion in the Heian and

Kamakura period The is a period of Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura by the first ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo after the conclusion of the Genpei War, which saw the struggle bet ...

s. The current chief priest claims to be the 97th generation descendant of Gyōman Daimyōjin. During the

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

era of

State Shinto was Imperial Japan's ideological use of the Japanese folk religion and traditions of Shinto. The state exercised control of shrine finances and training regimes for priests to strongly encourage Shinto practices that emphasized the Emperor as ...

, the shrine was rated as a County shrine in 1871 and was promoted to a Prefectural shrine in 1927 under the

Modern system of ranked Shinto Shrines The was an organizational aspect of the establishment of Japanese State Shinto. This system classified Shinto shrines as either official government shrines or "other" shrines. The official shrines were divided into #Imperial shrines (''kampeisha ...

In 1935, it was designed as the head shrine for approximately 2000 shrines in the country dedicated to Sarutahiko, although only a small fraction of these shrines actually have any connection to this shrine. One the other hand, the Tsubaki Grand Shrine is the head shrine for shrined dedicated to the "Tsubaki Daimyōjin", which exist all over the country and even overseas, such as the

Tsubaki Grand Shrine of America Tsubaki Grand Shrine of America, also sometimes known as Tsubaki America Jinja or in Japanese as , is the first Shinto shrine built in the mainland United States after World War II. It was erected in 1986 in Stockton, California, and moved to its ...

. As Sarutahiko is revered in ''

'', Tsubaki has a martial arts hall for practice, as well as an archery range for the practitioners of ''

kyūdō ''Kyūdō'' ( ja, 弓道) is the Japanese martial art of archery. Kyūdō is based on '' kyūjutsu'' ("art of archery"), which originated with the samurai class of feudal Japan. In 1919, the name of kyūjutsu was officially changed to kyūdō, a ...

''. There is also a ''

chashitsu ''Chashitsu'' (, "tea room") in Japanese tradition is an architectural space designed to be used for tea ceremony (''chanoyu'') gatherings. The architectural style that developed for ''chashitsu'' is referred to as the ''sukiya'' style (''suk ...

'' (teahouse) called Reishō-an, donated by the founder of

Panasonic formerly between 1935 and 2008 and the first incarnation of between 2008 and 2022, is a major Japanese multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate corporation, headquartered in Kadoma, Osaka, Kadoma, Osaka P ...

Matsushita Konosuke Matsushita (written: lit. "below the pine tree") is a Japanese surname. Notable people with the surname include: *Daisuke Matsushita (born 1981), a former Japanese football player *Hiro Matsushita (born 1961), former Japanese Champ Car racing driv ...

. Behind the main shrine hall is a sacred waterfall, Kinryū Myōjin no Taki, where ''

misogi is a Japanese Shinto practice of ritual purification by washing the entire body. Misogi is related to another Shinto purification ritual called ''Harae'' – thus both being collectively referred to as . Background Every year, many people ...

'' is practiced. The shrine is located a 45-minutes by bus from Kasado Station on the

JR Central is the main railway company operating in the Chūbu (Nagoya) region of central Japan. It is officially abbreviated in English as JR Central and in Japanese as JR Tōkai ( ja, JR東海, links=no). ''Tōkai'' is a reference to the geographical ...

Kansai Main Line The is a railway line in Japan, which connects Nagoya Station with JR Namba Station in Osaka. It is jointly run by the Central Japan Railway Company (JR Central) and West Japan Railway Company (JR West), with the boundary between both comp ...

Gallery

椿大神社 - 入口石鳥居2.JPG, Entry with Torii Uzume-honguu shrine.jpg, Uzume Hongū 椿大神社 - 拝殿1.JPG, Haiden 椿大神社 - 末社・松下幸之助社.JPG, sub-shrine dedicated to Matsushita Konosuke. 椿大神社 - 椿会館.JPG, Tsubaki Kaikan martial arts hall

References

* Plutschow, Herbe. ''Matsuri: The Festivals of Japan''. RoutledgeCurzon (1996) * Ponsonby-Fane, Richard Arthur Brabazon. (1959)
''The Imperial House of Japan.''
Kyoto: Ponsonby Memorial Society
OCLC 194887

External links

Official home page

��The Life And Thought of a Shinto Priest, by Guji Yukitaka Yamamoto (96th priest of Tsubaki Grand Shrine)

Notes

{{Authority control Shinto shrines in Mie Prefecture Ise Province Suzuka, Mie Ichinomiya Beppyo shrines

Enshrined ''kami''

Gallery

See also

References

External links

Notes