Episode 153: Ise and the Sun Goddess

July 16, 2026 Joshua Badgley

Priests at the Gekū, the Outer Shrine, in Ise, still perform rituals at the shrine today, following in the the traditions laid down generations before them. Photo by author.

Ise Shrine

Today, Ise Shrine is primarily made up of two compounds. There is the Outer Shrine, or Gekū, and then, about 4 km south is the Naikū, or inner shrine. Technically the Naikū enshrines Amaterasu Ōkami while the Gekū enshrines Toyouke-bime, a kami of the harvest. Most people are probably more familiar with the Naikū as that is where the shrine is famously rebuilt every 20 years.

While we have mention of Ise Shrine’s purported founding back in the reign of Ikume Iribiko, aka Suinin Tennō. However, there is a lot of doubt about what was actually happening in those passages, and how much we can trust the stories that are told. However, if that account is to be believed—along with the dates—then the shrine was founded back around 4 BCE.

Others suggest a later founding for the shrine. First off, if you believe the narrative, but not the dates, you are probably looking at a 3rd or 4th century founding. Alternatively, it may have been founded around the 5th century, as Wakatakiru no Ōkimi is said to have had a dream about establishing a shrine for Toyouke-bime, a harvest goddess connected with the land of Tanba. Finally, there is the thought that Ise Shrine was founded during the reigns of Ōama and Uno no Sarara—Temmu and Jitō Tennō—in the late 7th century.

Archaeological evidence has not yet shown major habitation in or around Ise Shrine. The capital of Ise no Kuni, which actually makes up most of modern Mie Prefecture, was in Suzuka, towards the northern end of the territory. This is also the location of Tsubaki Shrine and Tsubaki Grand Shrine, which each claim to be the original Ichinomiya, or First Shrine, of the land of Ise. This is an area with clear habitation and numerous large kofun. Kofun in Mie prefecture are first introduced in the north and then gradually spread southwards, but stop just short of the area of the shrines and modern Ise city. For a large part of the 6th century we find nothing and then, suddenly, a large, round kofun appears around 600 on the grounds of what would become the Outer Shrine of Ise, but then nothing seems to follow. It is very odd to have a kofun built within the grounds of a current worship site, so it is likely that the location of the kofun was not, originally, part of the Outer Shrine, or the Outer Shrine was built some time after the kofun.

As for the Inner Shrine, there is evidence of worship in the form of beads found in the river near the site dating from between the 5th and 7th centuries. So there was some kind of worship. Teeuwen and Breen suggest that this was probably to do with some kind of water ritual, as this would have been the source of the water that was used in the plains below. And yet, there also isn’t a lot of habitation that has been found in the areas around the shrine—just the occasional dwelling or burial, but no large settlements. Certainly nothing affiliated with a large organization such as the shrine is, today. These sites may have been important, but there don’t appear to have been much of consequence prior to the late 7th century, with the exception of that one outlier of a large kofun.

Teeuwen and Breen suggest that this area was actually an outpost, rather than a major population center. It was out of the way, not on the main route. This may also explain why worship of a deity that appeared to be feared or out of favor—if the Sujin episode has any truth to it—would have been put out here, so far away from the center of Yamato.

One last note is the protest of Miwa no Takechimaro against Uno no Sarara’s trip to Ise Shrine during her reign. The Miwa family drew at least some of their traditional status and authority from their position as the family in charge of the worship at Mt. Miwa, so they probably had the most to lose by Ise becoming ascendant. As such, their protest over Ise seems to make perfect sense, especially if this was a relatively new shrine, or if Ise Shrine was being built up and repurposed for the new royal project, which would indubitably result in the decline of the power of the Miwa shrine and family.

Amaterasu Ōkami

Today, Amaterasu is the chief kami of the pantheon of Shintō deities. She is often given pride of place above other kami, and just about every shrine has some connection to her along with their own tutelary deities. Yet there is evidence this wasn’t always the case, and that much of what we know about Amaterasu may have been solidified sometime during or after the late 7th century.

Prior to the 7th century, the primary focus of worship of Yamato, at least within the Nara basin, appears to have been directed at Mt. Miwa. This is also where we find archaeological evidence for early settlements, large, keyhole style kofun, and even a palace. The Makimuku Palace, which may have been the palace for Queen Himiko herself or someone closely related, is situated quite close to Mt. Miwa and Hashihaka kofun, the oldest keyhole shaped kofun of that size to date. The deity of Mt. Miwa is said to be Ōmononushi, and this may have been the primary deity of the Yamato court up through the reign of Naka no Ōe, aka Tenji Tennō.

The first evidence that Amaterasu may not have been the high deity depicted in the stories comes from the Nihon Shoki, where alternate stories often provide different kami and different names. Specifically we have Takami Musubi, a deity whose name would appear to indicate that they are the High August deity. In some stories, Takami Musubi is said to have given birth to 1500 other kami, and he is the one who is preparing the way for his grandchild, Ninigi, to go down and settle the Central Land of the Reed Plains. In other entries, Ninigi is the grandchild of both Takami Musubi and Amaterasu Ōkami.

Given everything else, it is odd that Amaterasu is not one of the eight kami listed in court rituals in the Engi Shiki. Those kami were, instead:

Taka Mi Musubi
Tama Tsume Musubi
Iku Musubi
Taru Musubi
Ō Miya Nome
Koto Shiro Nushi

Note that the “Musubi” kami seem to be quite common in this context.

There is also the fact that there are numerous kami with similar names and portfolios. On the one hand, the Wa people seem to have been rather preoccupied with the idea of a sun deity, but who that deity was is in question. It is possible that sun worship generally spawned numerous different accounts and stories of similar deities, and so we see names like “Ōhirume”, “Wakahirume”, “Amateru”, “Hoakari”. That last one I assume means something like “Light of Fire”, but what is that other than the sun? “Ho” and “Hi” both show up in Japanese as being related to either fire or the sun, and I can understand them being closely related.

We also have deities like Saruta Hiko no Kami. Saruta Hiko, who is, incidentally, worshipped at Tsubaki shrine, appears to have characteristics of a kami of the sky. He intercepts the August Grandchild on his descent from Heaven—so presumably in the sky—and he is often described as “bright” and “shining”. Some of the terms used to describe him have made others wonder if he wasn’t originally seen as a deity of the sky and sun himself.

Indeed, prior to the unification of the archipelago under Yamato rule, different lands would have had different kami that they worshiped in their own ways. There were likely commonalities because of shared cultural experiences, but stories were likely to be more focused on local polities and elites. It is possible that every land had its own vision of what the “sun kami” was like.

This also speaks to another aspect of Amaterasu—it is unclear if Amaterasu was originally seen as a female spirit. Certainly under the influence of continental thought, the sun was considered to be heavily Yang, and thus masculine. The terms to talk about kami in Japanese often are not gendered, though there are sometimes clues in the names. For instance, Izanagi and Izanami are basically paired kami, with “-gi” being related to “-ko” (as in Hiko) and “-mi” being related to “-me” (as in Hime). Amaterasu’s name does not provide any such obvious gendered markers. There is the other name she is given, “Ō-hiru-me-no-muchi”, but that may be a later addition as different traditions were brought together. Indeed, the name “Hirume” appears to be specifically connected to the story of weaving, and weaving was often seen as being related to women’s lifeways based on continental cultural biases. On the other hand, we also see Amaterasu donning arms and armor and putting their hair in a distinctly male braid to defend their rights and territory against a potential rival: Susano’o.

There certainly seems to be a tradition of kami with particularly male aspects. The stories of Ōmono-nushi describe the kami depict them and similar kami as arrows, snakes, and string—which can all have certain phallic properties. These are usually used in conjunction with a maiden who is made their “wife”. Add to this the number of women who are sent to care for the kami. When Amaterasu is taken out of the palace, along with Ōyamato no Kunitama, the Soul of the Country of Yamato, they are both given over to the service of women of the royal house: Toyosuki-bime and Nunaki-iri-bime. And there is something about them being women that is apparently important, and we find that it isn’t enough to just be a woman, but you must also be in good health. Nunaki-iri-bime is said to be unsuitable because she was bald and lean. Later, when Nunaki-waka-hime, in the next generation, takes over the worship of Ōyamato no Ōkami, she is not suitable because she is “emaciated”. So they specifically wanted young women to lead the worship, which goes along with patriarchal concept of the kami being spiritually “married” to the woman, who then would oversee the rituals for him.

Is this where the idea of Shrine Princesses, the Saiō or Saigū, comes from?

If Amaterasu started out being conceptualized as a male deity, that is definitely not the image we get by early 8th century, so something must have changed. One thing may be the fact that, as the stories were being written down, they were doing so to further promote Uno no Sarara. Herman Ooms notes that Amaterasu is a transparent double of Jitō, which is to say Uno no Sarara. They are both women who inherited rule of the land, and both are looking after the interests of their grandchild, who is meant to rule the archipelago, the Central Land of the Reed Plains. It is possible that it is during this time—or just after—that Amaterasu was conceived of as a primarily female deity.

Jingikan (神祇官)

Finally, we have the stand up of the Jingikan (or Jingikwan). The name “Jingi” comes from the longer concept of Tenjin-Chigi (天神地祇), which refers to the kami of heaven and of earth. This is also read as “Ama-tsu-kami, Kuni-tsu-kami”, a not uncommon phrase in modern Shinto norito. The idea of “Heavenly” and “Earthly” kami appears to have had some importance in the 7th century, and appear to have been in a hierarchical relationship, with the Earthly kami submitting to the Heavenly kami. This likely had political implications among the elite families who claimed Heavenly or Earthly kami as their ancestral ujigami.

The Nihon Shoki uses the term “Jingi” several times prior to Uno no Sarara’s reign, but it is only in that reign that we see the term “Jingi-kan”, suggesting that a formal court structure had not previously existed in the new bureaucratic system. This likely was instantiated in the Kiyomihara codes, begun under Ōama and finalized under Uno no Sarara. We do have the term “Jingi-haku” and it may be the case that there previously were some officials that were given some amount of authority over kami matters, but the stand-up of the Jingi-kan appears to take it a step further.

The first named Jingi-haku, or Kanzukasa no Kami, is Nakatomi no Ōshima. The Nakatomi were the court ritualists, so this appointment makes perfect sense. Nakatomi no Kamatari is said to have been offered the position of Jingi-haku, but it is unclear if that was actually the same position or, as noted above, a predecessor position which was then co-opted. By bringing the kami worship under the State, it was one more way for the State to maintain its control over the various levers of authority. Obviously they had military and economic power through their ability to call up soldiers and demand taxes. They also had created positional authority through the court hierarchy of ranks and even wrangling the old kabane system. They further took control over Buddhist institutions, and created “National” temples. Now they were taking control of kami matters. This went along with their attempt to re-organize the physical landscape in the form of the Fujiwara capital, as well.

An important note about the Jingikan is that at this time it seems almost more important than the Dajokan, the Council of State. The Jingikan was actually considered a separate branch of the government, not beholden to the Dajokan, directly under the sovereign. So the Jingikan and the Dajokan were technically at the same hierarchical level and, arguably, the Jingikan was actually more powerful at this point in history. That wouldn’t always be the case, and though it may have been influential, it did have a limited sphere of influence.

Shintō

One of the more debate-filled concepts in discussing the history of Japanese religion is Shintō. Certainly the idea of “Kami no Michi” (神道) is present in the old Chronicles, likely taking its cue from similar continental concepts of the “Way” of Heaven. And yet, there are also questions of whether it is an actual “religion” or more of a “cultural practice”. Are “kami”, as spirits, truly the same as “gods”? Without a centralized belief system, is it an “organized” religion? And when was it conceptualized as a single thing?

In many ways, Shintō is not defined in a vacuum. Without the introduction of Buddhism and other concepts from the continent, the kami and their worship were, in many ways, just another method of dealing with the natural world, just as farming, hunting, or wood cutting. There was no need to define what Shintō was or was not, and this is likely one of the ways that it was able to absorb and accomodate various practices and beliefs from the continent, early on.

It is in opposition to Buddhism that Shintō really seems to define itself, and a large part of that is likely due to the establishment of Ise Shrine, as well as the Shrine’s own pushback against Buddhism in later centuries. Indeeed, in the 8th century there was an attempt to create a temple at Ise Shrine, at the same time that Buddhism was incorporating shrines and local kami into its own worldview. However, that attempt ultimately failed, and created a backlash, such that the shrine specifically pushed back against Buddhist terminology and concepts, categorizing them similarly to other forms of spiritual pollution, at least within the Shrine grounds. As such, it would later be a model for what was “Shintō” versus what was “Buddhism”, and help to define just what the Way of the Kami meant.

Along with that you have the Kojiki, which would become the go-to text for many shrines—and people generally—regarding the founding stories of the kami, and rectifying the cosmological framework in which people positioned themselves, the kami, and their beliefs. Taken together, this period had a tremendous influence on everything that would come after it.

Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan. My name is Joshua, and this is Episode 153: Ise and the Sun Goddess.

In the newly built hall of the Fujiwara Palace, the nobles of the court were gathered for a grand banquet. Snow-white walls were off-set by the bright crimson pillars and trim, highlighted by the bright green windows.   The nobles themselves were a rainbow of colors, arranged as they were by rank.   At the head of it all, on a dais, sat the Queen herself, Uno no Sarara. However, the attention was no longer on her. Instead, it was on another figure, standing . They stood in front of the assembled audience. A , and a quiet spread throughout the hall, . Tthe court listeninged as Hieda no Are began to tell the story of the Sun Goddess in the Plain of High Heaven. They listened to the story of her and Susano’o, and of the backward flayed horse. They heard the tale of the Heavenly Rock Cave, and of all that came after, including the sending of the August Grandchild, Ninigi. They listened to the story—the story of Yamato.

Last episode, we talked in more detail about Uno No Sarara—starting from her early years as the daughter of Naka no Ohoe, granddaughter of Soga no Kurayamada, and child-bride to her uncle, Ohoama. I’ll admit we didn’t look too hard at that last bit, and I don’t have enough information to confirm what exactly “marriage” entailed in that context, but it is still something that I find tremendously creepy and, unfortunately, anything but unique. So I’m not going to dive too much further into it right now but… ew.
We talked about how she gave birth to her son, Kusakabe, in Kyushu, during the war on the continent, and how she eventually left for Yoshino with her husband when he retired from court, presumably to outsmart his court rivals, who were positioning him to be taken out. She also is said to have played a part in the planning and execution of the resulting Jinshin no Ran, later helping her husband govern the realm. And now, she was on the throne, overseeing the completion of many of the projects started in the reign of her husband. This included the completion of the Kiyomihara code, the Fujiwara palace, and the support given to the institution of Ise Grand Shrine.
This episode, I want to dive into that last topic: the emphasis in Uno no Sarara’s reign on continue a bit with the support given to Ise Shrine and its focus, the Great God, Amaterasu no Ohokami. Although the Chronicles talk about Amaterasu as one of the founding deities of the Yamato royal line, there is plenty of evidence that this story was grafted into the tales at a later date, and that worship of Amaterasu, at least as anything more than a minor deity, likely also started relatively latestarted at some later date. Some have even , with some ssuggesteding that Ise Shrine itself wasn’t even built until the late 7th century. So, all of this focus on Ise and Amaterasu This all appears to be part of the larger effort to structure the physical, cultural, and spiritual landscape of the new Yamato state.
Last episode we mentioned talked about how, according to the Nihon Shoki, some of the things specifically mentioned in the Nihon Shoki—about how Ohoama turned to worship towards Ise. Well, specifically, he worshipped Amaterasu Ohokami. So let’s take a moment and talk about what we know of the history of this Great God of Heavenly Brightness.
Unfortunately, most of that history is based on what we know of the kami from works like the Nihon Shoki, the Kojiki, and the Sendai Kuji Hongi, all of which came out in the 8th century or so. As such, it can be hard to know what things were actually like, earlier on, as opposed to what was added or removed laterand what was added to or removed, later.
Much of what I’m going to be talking about, today, I’m going to be pulling from a book written in 2017 by Mark Teeuvwen [Tayvin?] and John Breen titled “A Social History of the Ise Shrines”, as well as Michael Como’s work “Weaving and Binding: Immigrant Gods and Female Immortals in Ancient Japan”, published in 2009, along with other sources. In their book, Breen and Teeuwen point out that for those who do not take the events of the Nihon Shoki and Kojiki at face value, there are two primary theories for the origin of the worship of Amaterasu: an early theory and , classified into an early theory of the development of Amaterasu worship and a late theory of development. The early theory places the development of the worship of Amaterasu in the 5th and 6th centuries, during the reigns of such figures as Wakatakeru no Ohokimi, aka Yuuryaku Tennou. The Late Theory places the development in the 7th century, largely at the feet of such figures as Ohoama and Uno no Sarara herself. We’ll take a look at the evidence and see what it says.
I would note that compared to the official history, per Ise Grand Shrine, today,, both of these would be very late theories. According to Ise Grand Shrine even today, is that Amaterasu arrived in Ise in the 26th year of Ikume Iribiko, aka Suinin Tennou, as stated in the Nihon Shoki, which and correspondsing to 4 BCE if you take the dating of the Nihon Shoki to be accurate. Of course, , but we’ve already spent plenty of time talking about the problems with the Nihon Shoki prior to the 6th century CE, and even then, as we shall see, there are still some questions we have about events givenas well as how the political nature of the text affected what it contained.
So to kick things off, let’s address the biggest question of all: why don’t we believe that Amaterasu no Ohokami was always the primary deity of the pantheon of Yamato, at the very least, if not all of the Wa people of the archipelago? After all, isn’t she a sun goddess, and isn’t sun worship fairly well documented among the ancient Japanese? Just take a look at words like “Hiko” and “Hime”, referring to rulers as sun man and sun woman. Also note that early on, worship seems to have centered around been focused on places such as mountaintops, which focused worship towards the sky and the highest point. In fact, as wet rice paddy agriculture became the dominant economic factor driving the engine of the archipelago in the Yayoi and early kofun period, early shrines were very likely about bringing the spirit of the mountain from the mountaintop and giving them a home amongst the rice fields. as wet rice paddy agriculture became the dominant economic factor driving the engine of the archipelago in the Yayoi and early kofun period.
And then we have the stories. Don’t the ancient stories all tell about Amaterasu as the ruler of Takama no Hara, the Heavenly Plain? And isn’t it her grandchild that then descends to the earth to pacify the Land of the Reed Plains—aka the Japanese archipelago?
Well let’s take a look at those same stories, which we’ve covered in earlier episodes of the podcast. The first deities mentioned in the Chronicles are deities like Ama no Minaka Nushi, Lord of the August Middle of Heaven; Takami Musubi, High August Growth; and Kami Musubi, Divine August Growth. There are other deities, like Kuni Toko Tachi, but they are barely mentioned again.
Later we get Izanagi and Izanami, the masculine and feminine, who create the world and give birth to numerous deities from that point on. Among the children of Izanagi are said to be Amaterasu, Tsukiyomi, and Susano’o. Amaterasu, Heaven’s Brightness, represents the sun while Tsukiyomi represents the dark of the moon. Susano’o is then the god of the storms and seas, and was sent to the Nether Land, the Ne no Kuni.
Right away we see that there are numerous different stories listed in the Nihon Shoki for just about everything. Only the Kojiki gives everything as a single, coherent narrative, but surely the readers in the 8th century would have known some of these other stories, and thus the Nihon Shoki gives the alternates stories as well.
Now the main narrative of the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki tells us that Ama-terasu no Oho-kami was born to rule over everything. In Tthe Nihon Shoki, has Izanagi and Izanami specifically mention that divine destiny in Amaterasu’s creation—although actually, in that part of the text, the deity they y are creating is named Oho-hiru-me no Muchi; the Great Sun Female Holder. And in the next entry they call Amaterasu: Ama-terasu Oho-hiru-me. Tsukiyomi, the deity of the moon, is made to be her consort, and they are supposedly sent to rule the plain of Heaven, Takama no Hara.
The problem is that there are other entries that suggest that Takama no Hara already had a ruler: Taka-mi-Musubi. Reading the sections on Taka-mi-Musubi, we see a deity who is said to have produced 1500 children, himself—no mention of Izanagi and Izanami. Some of his children are mentioned as Omohi-kane: the Thought-Combining deity, and Sukuna-bikona: the Little-Prince-Named deity.
Amatsu Hiko Hiko Ho Ninigi no Mikoto, the August Heavenly Prince, Prince Ho-ninigi, [EB1.1]is not just a grandson of Amaterasu no Ohokami, but also a grandchild of Taka-mi Musubi. In at least one story, he Takami Musubi is the one who wants Ninigi no Mikoto to become the ruler of the Central Land of the Reed Plains. Towards that end, Taka-mi Musubihe gathers the various kami and chooses someone to go down and prepare the way—Ama-ho-hi no Mikoto—who was to quote-unquote “expel and subdue” the evil gods of that land. We covered this story in episode 21 and 22X. When that doesn’t work, he gathers them again, sending others to try and do the same. Eventually he sends Takemikazuchi and Futsunushi down. All of this sounds like Taka-mi Musubi, whose name appears to refer to being the “high” deity, was the one in charge.
In addition, we have the court ritual from sources like the Engi Shiki, which illustrates the deities that were invoked for the protection of the palace and the royal family. These were: Kami-musubi, Takami-musubi, Iku-musubi, Taru-musubi, Tamatsume-musubi, Oomiya-no-me, Oomiketsu-no-kami and Kotoshironushi. One might notice a lot of the “musubi” names among the deities, and a distinct lack of appeal to Amaterasu. If Amaterasu were the central deity and ancestral deity of the royal family, why is she not invoked in the rituals of the court itself?
The thought, here, ais that these rituals are likely much older than the worship of Amaterasu, and while Amaterasu would come to prominence in the stories that the court would tell, it was much more difficult for them to rearrange the traditional rituals to put her front and center. Those rituals were maintained kept by the ritualist families, like the Nakatomi, and they weren’t likely to change the rituals willy-nilly, even for a sovereign. That was playing with supernatural fire, after all—if you changed the rituals, would they still even be effective? Granted, rituals do change, so it isn’t a perfect argument; perhaps it was just not considered to be important enough to make the change since it was not something that anyone except the court ritualists needed to worry themselves over. Either way, it appears that we do have a list of deities that may have been the deities of the ruling elite prior to the rise of Amaterasu and Ise shrine more generally.
We have a few other clues of what was going on in the narrative. For instance, we see the story from the reign of Mimaki Iribiko, aka Sujin Tennou, also called the First Sovereign of Yamato, despite the legendary figures inserted prior to his reign. It is in this chapter that we see a note that Ama-terasu no Oho-kami and Yamato no Oho-kuni-dama, which is to say the Spirit of the Country of Yamato, were both worshipped together in the hall—that is in the royal palace itself. And yet apparently Mimaki Iribiko feared these deities residing with him in the palace, and he had their worship moved to locations outside of the palace. Amaterasu’s worship was given to Toyosuki-iri-bime, one of Mimaki Iribiko’s daughters, and established in the district of Shiki, in Yamato. Yamato no Ohokunidama, on the other hand, was given over to Nunaki-iri-bime no Mikoto, another daughter through a different wife. but we are told that she was lean, and her hair was falling out, and so she couldn’t perform the rites.
Turning our attention back to Ama-terasu—in the reign of Ikume-Iribiko, aka Suinin Tennou, son and heir of Mimaki Iribiko, the worship of Ama-terasu would pass from Mimaki Iribiko’s daughter, Nunaki Iri Bime to Ikume Iribiko’s daughter, Yamato Hime. She would move the worship site from Shiki to Uda, in the shadow of Mt. Miwa, and then proceed over to the upper banks, or Kawakami, of Isuzu, in the district of Watarai. Here, in one of the alternate stories about this episode, we get the Great God of Yamato—Ohoyamato no Ohokami—speaking through a medium to warn the sovereign that he had better be careful. Mimaki Iribiko had not been quite thorough enough in his worship, so he had not had a long life, and if Ikume Iribiko didn’t do the same, he would suffer a similar fate.
And so, in a record eerily similar to what we see in the previous reign, the worship of the “Great God of Yamato”, the Oho-Yamato no Oho-kami, is given to Nunaki-waka-hime—as opposed to Nunaki-Iri-bime—who also fails in the task because of her emaciated body. This also introduces Fukayu nushi, an ancestor of the Nakatomi, who was the one who divined what should be done.
There is so much to unpack in these stories. For one, the kami bring power, but also danger. One can try to placate the kami, but it isn’t like a ritual will always work, and the story is of the sovereign being actively afraid of what they might do, so they were removed from the palace. Then there is the fact that we see two seemingly similar names—Ohoyamato no Ohokami and Yamato no Kunidama both seem like we are talking about the same spirit of Yamato, though some would point out that one is the spirit of the country and one is the great kami of the country, so, clearly different. Both are also being given to someone named “Nunaki—something-something—Hime”, and in both cases Nunaki seems to fail in her task because she is apparently not hot enough for the kami. She’s described as too thin and emaciated or balding. We aren’t given the lineage of Nunaki Waka Hime, but Nunaki Iri Bime is connected with the land of Owari. Nunaki Iri-bime is said to be the daughter of Mimaki Iribiko and Ohoama Hime, ancestor of the Owari no Muraji. Owari was the land that supported Ohoama during the Jinshin no Ran.
Finally, in both cases, we see the worship of the spirit of Yamato being given over to someone name “Nagochi”, later identified as Nagochi no Sukune, ancestor of the Yamato no Atahe.
One more note—closely on the heels of moving out these two kami out of the palace, we see that the court they brings in the worship of Oho-mono-nushi, the god of Mt. Miwa, under Ohotataneko, the ancestor of the Miwa clan.
So the stories here account for Ama-terasu being moved to Watarai and why she isn’t worshipped in the palace. It also places Oho-mono-nushi at the center of worship in Yamato. Oho-mono-nushi and Miwa continue to dominate the narrative from here on out, with a few notable exceptions, such as with Okinaga Tarashi Hime, aka Jingu Tennou and her mythical conquest of the Korean peninsula. I’m sure that had no political implications at all given everything that had happened with Baekje, Silla, and the Tang dynasty in the latter half of the 7th century. Other than scenes like that, however, the Miwa clan and worship of the Miwa deity appears frequently in the narrative. It is clear that Mt. Miwa, and its deity, were important, and when Breen and Teeuwen hypothesize that when Naka no Ohoe, which is to say Tenji Tennou, took the drastic step of moving the capital up to Ohotsu, in the land of Afumi, he also brought the Miwa deity with him. Those Afumi court rituals were conducted under the auspices of the Nakatomi, and particularly the auspices of Nakatomi no Kane, who would become one of the chief opponents of Ohoama during the Jinshin no Ran in 672.
After that conflict, Ohoama and his wife, Uno no Sarara, were building new traditions using Ise and constructing new legends. Legends that would be under their control and influence and which would further bolster their rule from the city that they had designed to fit inside of this newly constructed cosmological framework.
And yet this also brings up what seems like an obvious question. If Ise Shrine and the worship of Amaterasu were so central to Ohoama and Uno’s plans, then why would they put it so far away? Proponents of the “early” theory of the development of Amaterasu and Ise Shrine suggest that the answer lies in the text of the Chronicles. That there is some truth to the idea that there was worship in Yamato and that, for various reasons, it moved out to Watarai district early on and developed into Ise Shrine. Those who hold to the “late” theory of development see all of those stories as later inserts meant to explain away why Ise Shrine was so far away—and perhaps why Amaterasu was not included in the cool-kami club of court ritual.   Teeuwen and Breen mention a few of the theories, from Naoki Koujiro stressing Ise as a strategic gateway between Yamato and Eastern Japan to Tanaka Takashi proposing that the movement of Amaterasu to Ise is actually a stand-in for one or more military campaigns to that area to bring it under Yamato control[EB2.1].
And before we move too much further in the narrative, let’s talk about how Ise is physically and geographically situated. Ise is part of modern Mie prefecture, on the eastern edge of the Ki peninsula. It is at the southern end of a series of adjoining alluvial plains that follow the coastline north to the modern prefectures of Aichi and Gifu—the ancient provinces of Owari and Mino. The capital of Ise Province used to be in Suzuka, near the the two Tsubaki shrines which both lay claim to the title of Ise no Ichinomiya, the First shrine of the land of Ise, and the pass that served as one of three major routes from eastern Japan into the Home Provinces and beyond. This puts Ise about as far away as you can get from the capital of the province without going over the mountains, themselves. It also puts it a good deal south of most major travel routes. If you are going to Ise shrine then it is pretty clear you were going to Ise shrine, as there isn’t a lot of evidence for anything else in the area.
The Shrine itself is actually made up of two primary shrine complexes. There is the Naiku, the inner shrine, and the Geku, or outer shrine. The Naiku, or inner shrine, is probably the area most people think about. It is at the foot of the mountains where the Shimamichi River joins the Isuzu River and both flow out of the mountains. The Naiku contains the shrine to Amaterasu no Ohokami, and is famous for its layout, where there are actually two shrine enclosures, one next to the other. The main shrine is then rebuilt in the empty enclosure every 20 years, at which point the worship is moved to the new shrine, the old shrine is torn down, and the cycle is started once again.
The Outer Shrine, or Geku, is further north, and probably not as well known to foreigners. The Geku is said to enshrine the spirit of Toyouke-bime, a kami dedicated to food. According to the traditions of the Geku itself, Toyouke-bime was enshrined in the Geku at the command of Wakatakiru no Ohokimi, aka Yuuryaku Tennou, based on a dream.
Regarding the history of why the Shrines—both Inner and Outer—are located here, aArchaeological evidence doesn’t give us a lot to suggest that these might be the case. Despite the presence of the Miya River near Ise Shrine, we haven’t found evidence of a large harbor or port, like we might expect if it was the jumping off point[EB3.1] for crossing Ise Bay—or even the center of another large polity. Instead, the areas to the north—around Fujikata and Matokata inlets, for instance—show much more evidence of occupation and, presumably, use. [EB4.1] Heck, the modern district of Fujikata is in the town of “Tsu”, which literally means “port”. And the capital area of Suzuaka and The the Ichinomiya of Tsubaki Grand Shrine is even farther north, still. So who, if anybody, was living down in the area of Ise Shrine?.
If we look at the progression of tomb mounds in the area in previous centuries, we see that they start in the Matokata region in the 5th century and work their way down towards the south, with late 5th century tombs found in the district of Taki[EB5.1], the district bordering on Watarai and modern Ise City to the northwest. It is also where you can find the Saikuu, the site of the old purification palace for the Shrine Princesses. Grave goods seem to show close ties with Yamato, in the Nara basin. While the tombs expanded to the south through the 5th century, they appear to have stopped altogether in the 6th century—or at least we haven’t found any. This may indicate that the political situation had changed and there was no group in the area that could organize the labor for such an undertaking. Whether that was because Yamato was taking it as corvee labor or just that population had dwindled due to war, famine, or something else, I don’t know that we could say.
Around the year 600, at the opening of the 7th century, we do see a large grave mound erected in the core area of what would later become Ise Shrine, on the east side of the Miya River, overlooking what would become the Geku, the Outer Shrine of the Ise complex. For those who aren’t aware, Ise Grand Shrine is a large complex of shrines, and it is divided into two main areas. The “inner shrine”, or Naiku, is where most people go, and it is the site of the famous shrine building that is supposed to be rebuilt every 20 years. The Geku is the “outer shrine” complex, technically dedicated to Toyouke hime, a kami of agriculture. The kofun overlooking the outer shrine is known as the Takakurayama kofun. This is a round kofun, about 35 to 40 meters in diameter, with a horizontal stone chamber. It is the largest in the Ise region. It has been mentioned in records going back to at least the Kamakura era, and even though most of the grave goods are gone, there is evidence that it was richly appointed. Given its shape and location, there were even those in later centuries who connected it with the Heavenly Rock Cave in which Amaterasu hid according to the ancient stories.
The fact that there was nothing around this area and suddenly we see a giant tomb mound is pretty puzzling. Why was it built here? Is it connected to the founding of the Outer Shrine in some way, or is that just coincidental?. Teeuwen and Breen point out that it is pretty rare for a large tomb mound to be build in the precincts of an active shrine, which suggests that whatever was happening there, that area was not part of the shrine grounds. That said, I have to wonder if the ritual worship at the kofun might not have later been transformed or coopted into something else.
There also is no other indication that the Outer Shrine area was used for ritual purposes any earlier than the kofun would have been built. In contrast, around the Inner Shrine area, several kilometers away, there are cachces of beads dated to the 5th, 6th, and 7th centuries in a small valley where a brook runs down from Mt. Asama, not too far from the current shrine complex. Teeuwen and Breen suggest that this may relate to the “upper reaches of the Isuzu River”, mentioned in the Chronicles, and that it may have had to do with rituals related to water supply—hence being found at the point where the water was coming down from the mountains. And yet, despite these finds, there really aren’t any large scale archaeological remains that have been discovered east of the Miya river, though there are modest signs of dwelling and habitation, and some minor burials mounds.
Compare this to Tsubaki shrine, the home of Saruta Hiko no Kami, and the main shrine of Ise, situated in the ancient capital of Ise no Kuni. Downstream from there are numerous tomb mounds and indications of habitation. So this was probably the center for early sun worship in the region.[EB6.1]
Teeuwen and Breen conclude that all of this indicates that the region of Taki and areas east of the Miya river were probably more of an outpost—no major powerful chieftains or large polity had set up in the region. In the late 6th century, some power had to move in to build Takakurayama kofun, but that was an outlier. Maybe this area just largely fell under Yamato hegemony. And perhaps that was the key. Perhaps initially this wasn’t a place to center power and authority, but rather it was more like a prison. It was a place far away from the court, where a deity that was more of a threat could be kept away from the palace and the sovereign. Perhaps Amaterasu, or whoever the kami was at the time, was placed out here because of the threat they posed, much as the Chronicle seems to suggest—just not necessarily at the time that is suggested.
One of the aspects of the mythmaking that we see in the Chronicles appears to be the stress on the Amatsu kami and Kunitsu Kami—the Heavenly deities and the Earthly deities. The Heavenly deities are those in Takama no Hara, and they are the progenitors of the royal line. On the other hand are the earthly kami, the Kunitsu Kami, those dwelling on the earthly plane. In the stories that were recorded in the Nihon Shoki, before the August Grandchild of Takami Musubi and Ama Terasu descended to take control of the Central Land of the Reed Plain, they sent down heavenly kami as warriors to subdue the earthly kami. On the one hand, this may have been driven by some kind of deep memory of early conquests of the archipelago by various forces. However, these legends it also served another purpose, in that itthey set up the royal family’s right to rule, and it appears to establish a de facto hierarchy between those families descended from the Heavenly Kami and those descended from the earthly Kami.
Another thing that Teeuwen and Breen point out and that is that Amaterasu is not necessarily a female deity, to start with. In fact, Amaterasu was probably easily overlain atop the worship of Oho-mono-nushi of Mt. Miwa, at least early on. To that point, they note the stories where , particularly about Oho-mono-nushi and other deities , where they were commonly depicted as arrows, snakes, or similarly phallic imagery finding or even penetrating women who were thought to have a connection with them.   This suggests a context of these priestesses being married to the kami, and even fits in with early descriptions of individuals like the famous Queen Himiko being a spiritual leader as well as a political one. If the original Amaterasu was conceived of as a male deity, then this could also explain the tradition of the Saigu, the consecrated shrine princess. We only see a few royal princesses designated to the position[EB7.1] up to this point in the narrative, and, beyond Tokosuki Iri bime and Yamato hime, we don’t necessarily learn much more. One wonders if there weren’t other royal princesses likewise sent elsewhere to serve other deities. We know about Nunaki Iri Hime, and presumably Nunaki Waka Hime. There was also Yamato Totohi Momoso Hime, who was married to Oho-mono-nushi. Presumably there were others who just never ended up in the stories that were passed down.
The idea of the a kami taking a “wife” and connecting that to the idea of women holding these priestly positions seems to fall in line with much of what we see, though, as I said, we only hear occasionally about the appointment of royal princesses to the position until the reign of Ohoama. That’s when we see specifics about appointments, the purification palace in Hase, and other arrangements. It makes you wonder more than a little bit if Royal Princess Ohoku was, perhaps, the first royal princess to actually be appointed. It would have been easy enough to add in previous “shrine princesses” into the lineage, especially far enough back that nobody could really fact check it. We also see Royal Princess Taki journey to Ise with her companions, Princess Yamashiro no Hime and Lady Ishikawa.
It is intriguing that this practice iwas temporarily interrupted during the reign of Uno no Sarara, as I mentioned last episode. Could this have something to do with a female ruler on the throne and a corresponding lack of urgency about having a female representative at Ise?
And in the stories about Amaterasu, she is frequently shown with certain masculine qualities. When she confronts her younger brother, Susano’wo, she is concerned that he might try to take her authority from her, so . Sshe meets him decked out in armor, her hair tied up in a typical male fashion, with a bow, ready for a fight. It would be just as easy to imagine that Amaterasu and Susano’wo were brothers, contending over rulership. Add to all of that the idea that kami were often personifications of various natural phenomena or ideas, and Japanese is not a naturally gendered language, and there are those that believe that the stories of Amaterasu were not necessarily about a female deity in the beginning, but a male deity, similar to Ohomono Nushi and others, who then took on a feminine persona.
On the other hand there are passages in the old stories recounted in the Chronicles that clearly make Amaterasu out to be a woman.
To start with is the activities she is associated with, such as weaving, which isare often associated with women as something they do in the home. This is a tradition carried over from the continent, along with silk and the techniques to weave it. In the lands where silk production started, there are silkworm goddesses and the gendered nature of silk production and weaving appears to have come over to Japan as well. There is also the fact that Amaterasu is said to have another name: Oho-hiru-me no muchi. In this case, it would seem to mean something like Great Noontime Female Possessor. And in the weaving hall it is sometimes Amaterasu that is weaving and sometimes Waka Hirume. “Hirume” certainly feels like a feminine name.
There is the distinct possibility that the stories of Amaterasu as recorded were actually about two or more different kami, so Amaterasu and Ohohirume could have been separate deities having to do with the sun that were rolled into a single kami. As mentioned before, it is also possible that Amaterasu ended up with some stolen valor taken from the other Ise deity worshiped at Tsubaki, Saruta-hiko no Kami[EB8.1].   Teeuwen and Breen also note that the name “Amaterasu” is hardly unique, noting at least ten other shrines with a kami called “Amateru” or “Amaterasu”, mostly in Yamato, but some as far away as Kyushu and Tsushima. Nine of those shrines were dedicated to Ame no Hoakari, an ancestor deity of the Owari lineage who was also closely tied in to metalworking. It is worth remembering that it was Owari who helped support Ohoama during the Jinshin no Ran, and who may have even fostered Ohoama for a while when he was just a young prince. All that to say there may have been several different traditions that were all contributing different elements to the story.
And then there is the connection between Amaterasu and Uno no Sarara.
Herman Ooms, in his book: “Imperial Politics and Sybmolics in Ancient Japan”, notes the similarities between Amaterasu and Uno no Sarara, talking about the differences between the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki, both of which had events that mirrored Uno no Sarara’s own life. According to Ooms, “The Kojiki’s Amaterasu is a transparent double of the female tennou Jitou”. He points out that Uno no Sarara, besides her posthumous title of Jitou Tennou, also had a title making reference to Takamanohara: Takama no Hara Hirono no Hime—the Princess High-Heaven-Plain. But beyond that, we also see other linkages between the stories. For instance, it isn’t Amaterasu’s son, Ame no Oshihomimi who is given the realm, but rather her grandchild, Ninigi. This parallels the way that Uno no Sarara’s son, Kusakabe, didn’t ascend to the throne, but instead Uno no Sarara was holding the seat for his son, her grandson. So one sees how Uno no Sarara could be seen as Amaterasu, and her grandson, Prince Karu, could be seen as Ninigi, the August grandchild.
Teeuwen and Breen also note that during this same time, we see the rise of a new institution: the Jingikan. Again, we touched on this last episode, so just a quick recape: The Jingikan was a government organization set up specifically to oversee the shrines, rituals, ceremonies, and other such things pertaining to the kami matters. It does not appear in the initial stand-up of the new, bureaucratic government, wherein is created the bureaus, ministries, or departments, depending on your chosen vernacular, which make up the Dajokan, the Great Council of State. Instead, the Jingikan is a separate organization, specifically organized around kami matters.
The term “Jingi” is also a shorthand for “Ama-tsu-kami, Kuni-tsu-kami”, or the kami of Heaven and the Kami of the earth. “Ama-tsu-kami”, meaning Kami of Heaven, was written with two characters meaning “Heaven” and “Kami”, pronounced “Tenjin”. “Kuni-tsu-kami”, or the Kami of the Earth, was written as “Earth” and “Earth Spirit”, which was then pronounced “Chigi”. By taking the last character of each compound Tenjin-Chigi becomes just Jingi, for short. Throughout the Chronicles, this term, “Jingi” is thrown around when they want to quickly note all the kami, together, though sometimes it is fully written out as “Tenjin Chigi”, as well. Interestingly, “Tenjin” or “Ama tsu Kami”, sometimes appears alone, especially in the chapters on the Age of the Gods. However, “Chigi” seems to only be used in the whole phrase. There are a few instances, however, of “Chijin” being used, but they are few.
That said, the term “Jingikan”, also read as “Kami Tsukasa” or even “Kan Zukasa”, doesn’t appear until 690, in the reign of Uno no Sarara. This probably means that it was part of the reforms encompassed by the Kiyomihara codes. The head of the Jingikan is known as the Jingihaku or “Kan-zukasa no Kami”. This term actually shows up well in advance of the Jingikan itself, initially referring to an unnamed official or officials in charge of kami worship at the court. Nakatomi no Kamatari is said to have been offered the position in the first reign of Takara, aka Kougyoku Tennou, though the first confirmed individual appears to be Nakatomi no Ohoshima, during the reign of Uno no Sarara.
This appears to be a distinctly Yamato invention in the bureaucratic system. It leverages the language and structure of the Tang dynasty, but in its own way. There was a Tang department of shrines, but it was described differently, as befits a different spiritual environment focused on ancestor worship and Confucian and Taoist ideas. The Jingikan system is seems to have been a deliberate re-organization of the indigenous kami worship, incorporating what was probably traditional roles into the new bureaucratic system. In so doing, however, it also gave the court greater control, and given that this was happening at the same time as the establishment of various stories and myths around Ise and the foundation more generally, it appears to be part of a concerted and deliberate effort to construct a new narrative..[EB9.1]
All of this points to them architecting much of what was going on, . Ffrom the stories to the landscape. Ohoama likely built the inner shrine as we know it. If it really was an obscure, out-of-the-way shrine, perhaps that also meant that there weren’t any other powerful court factions that were enhanced by it. And then, over time, the Ise shrine and the deity there could be better incorporated into the overall myths and stories that surrounded the formation of Yamato. A new Yamato, one that would soon enough be referring to itself as the origin of the Sun: Nippon, a name often attributed to Ohoama and Uno no Sarara, though not found in the record of their reigns in the Chronicles.
Another aspect to all of this, however, is what happened immediately after Uno no Sarara’s reign, and into the 8th and early 9th centuries. In the 8th century—the Nara period—Buddhism started to merge with a lot of the local practices. This was not uncommon. Buddhism had been born in a land with myriad deities and styles of worship, and it had the means to incorporate local deities into its cosmological worldview. Kami were just other beings, stuck in the cycle of rebirth, who, as sentient beings, could equally benefit from the Buddha’s teachings. They became guardians of Buddhist institutions, and the lines between shrines and temples were often blurred. At the same time, kami worship was also taking on various concepts from continental worship, such that even today we find a lot of what we might consider Taoist practices influencing Shinto worship.
Had this continued, worship of the kami may have been completely subsumed into the Buddhist ritual practices, but there were areas where kami worship remained distinct. One of these was at Ise.
Early on, there was an attempt to y would try and build a temple at Ise, but it didn’t last long. The temple was eventually moved out of the shrine complex, and then eventually it was removed altogether. Later writings from the Shrine would include certain Buddhist terms among the things that were taboo within the shrine grounds, considering Buddhism as something of a corrupting or polluting influence. Shrine Princeses, during their tenure, had to devote themselves to the kami, and though they might retire as nuns, later in life, during their appointment they were to be free of any Buddhist influences.
In many ways this would make Ise a prime example of what would eventually be termed “Shinto”, which gave it, and the worship of Amaterasu, a certain pride of place. Of course, it didn’t hurt that it was also intertwined with the State and the founding myths of the nation. As such, Ise Shrine and its worship would become a template for many others to follow, helping to shape what we know as “Shinto” today.
There are still a lot of questions. We don’t exactly know what Uno no Sarara did on her trip to Ise Shrine, and we don’t know how things surrounding the worship at Ise and of Amaterasu herself changed in the intervening years between when these events happened and when, about two to three decades later, the Chronicles were finalized and published. Certainly some of itthis seems tied to the Fujiwara capital, which was no longer populated at that point, the move to Heijo-kyo, in Nara, occurring between 708 and 710, two years before the Kojiki and a decade before the Nihon Shoki would come out. And yet, the three sacred mountains that were incorporated into the plan of the Fujiwara Capital, Mt. Kagu, Mt. Miminashi, and Mt. Unebi, seem to continue to be important. This is especially true of Mt. Kagu, whose heavenly counterpart, Ame no Kaguyama—literally Heavenly Mt. Kagu— continues to play a major role in the stories surrounding Amaterasu and the Heavenly Rock Cave. In addition,, andMt. Unebi is closely tied to the story of Iware-biko, aka Jimmu, conquering and settling the land—perhaps to draw attention away from the stories about Mimaki and Ikume iribiko, aka Sujin and Suinin, who were both associated more with Mt. Mimoro, aka Mt. Miwa. [EB10.1]So even though the physical presence was moved, by that point we know that foundation of many of these stories were likely laid down around the time that the Fujiwara capital was in operation. What does seem clear is that, just as there were clear efforts to set up the new State government, including the new capital, the courty were also taking control of other levers of power and influence. We previously talked about how they court had created National Temples and included government positions to oversee Buddhist affairs more generally. With Ise and the creation of the Jingikan, it appears as though that trend continued with the traditional kami worship.
Many of the elite families still had connections to their own shrines, with their own kami. Through the stories collected and written down—with a few editorial additions to help place them in an approved context—they were able to construct a narrative from separate or divergent traditions. These traditions had already accreted to themselves various stories and culture-ways, some of them with clear links to the continent and others with overlapping portfolios. The kami, and the ability to intercede with them for their blessings or to avert their wrath, were a form of power that was being structured for the purpose of supporting the new State. A state now under the control of one Uno no Sarara.
And we don’t exactly have to wonder about this… the preface of the Kojiki all but says it. They put the words in the mouth of Ohoama, or, as they call him, the SoverignSovereign of the Kiyomihara Palace. But the words are pretty clear:
"I hear that the Imperial Records and Ancient Writing handed down by the various houses have come to differ from the truth and that many false hoods have been added to them. If these errors are not remedied at this time, their meaning will be lost before many years have passed. This is the framework of the state, the great foundation of the imperial influence. Therefore, recording the Imperial Records and examining the Old Writings, discarding the mistaken and establishing the true, I desire to hand them on to later generations.”
With that, 28 year old Hieda no Are was given the command to learn all the stories and presumably to recite them for the court. And several decades later, Oho no Yasumaro was given the task to take Are’s stories and write them down. I imagine that Hieda no Are, or perhaps someone else who had learned the stories well enough, would be called into court or banquets to present some of the stories, or would be asked questions if there was any need for precedence. Thus creating a single source for truth, according to the administration.
At the same time, the courty had a problem. They couldn’t control all of the sources of written material, with all of the various contradictions, so we also would eventually get the more comprehensive—but also less narratively direct—Nihon Shoki as well. After all, the game of propaganda was being played at many levels, and while the royal household had their motivations—primarily to support the legitimacy of their claim to power and the system within which that claim was validated—the other families wanted to ensure that they were properly recorded as having connections to traditional nexuses of power—be that the ancient kami of Heaven or Earth, or the their relationship to the royal family. This is because precedence was important, even as new traditions were being created. Like the way that the Mononobe and the Nakatomi played important roles in Uno no Sarara’s ascension ceremony despite the actual individuals using new or different names, like Isonokami or Fujiwara. See Episode 151 for the explanation, there. And new traditions were much easier to justify if you could connect them with older traditions—whether those older traditions were truly ancient or newly made inventions.
And all of this suggests that this was not an accident and it wasn’t simply being imposed from the top down. One could be charitable and suggest that those involved felt that this got them closest to what the truth actually was, given that they had now been inculcated in a new worldview and they were trying to view the ancient stories through the interpretive lens of that worldview. On the other hand, they were ultimately doing it to structure power and authority that favored them and the government they had created. A government that they hoped would outlast them, and be passed on to their descendants.
Next episode, we will continue our discussion of Uno no Sarara’s life and reign and the incredible steps she took to ensure that her line would continue to rule Yamato for decades.
Until then if you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts. If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website, SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode.
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Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast.
And that’s all for now. Thank you again, and I’ll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan.

References

Bentley, John R. (2025). Nihon Shoki: The Chronicles of Japan. ISBN 979-8-218634-67-4 pb
Teeuwen, Mark and Breen, John. (2017). A social history of the Ise shrines: divine capital. Bloomsbury Academic.
Duthie, T. (09 Jan. 2014). Man’yōshū and the Imperial Imagination in Early Japan. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004264540
Como, M. (2009). Weaving and binding : immigrant gods and female immortals in ancient Japan. University of Hawaiʻi Press.
Ooms, H. (2009). Imperial Politics and Symbolics in Ancient Japan: The Tenmu Dynasty, 650-800. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press. https://muse.jhu.edu/book/8316.
Chamberlain, B. H. (1981). The Kojiki: Records of ancient matters. Rutland, Vt: C.E. Tuttle Co. ISBN4-8053-0794-3.
Aston, W. G. (1972). Nihongi, chronicles of Japan from the earliest times to A.D. 697. London: Allen & Unwin. ISBN0-80480984-4
Philippi, D. L. (1968). Kojiki. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. ISBN4-13-087004-1

Episode 152: Queen Uno no Sarara, Part 1

July 1, 2026 Joshua Badgley

Round, crimson half-pillars on a white stone base mark the location of the original pillars of a large building. Beyond t he modern buildings, in the background, is a green, domed mountain. Another mountain range can be seen in the far distance. — Markers indicating the site of the pillars of the daigokuden, or great audience hall, of the Fujiwara Palace. In the background is Mt. Unebi, one of three sacred mountains incorporated into the landscape of the capital and the landscape of the ancient tales recorded in the Nihon Shoki and the Kojiki. Photo by author.

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Early Life

Uno no Sarara is thought to have been born around 645. Her father was Royal Prince Naka no Ōe, later known as Tenji Tennō. Her mother was Ochi no Iratsume, the daughter of Soga no Kurayamada no Ishikawa no Maro. Naka no Ōe was betrothed to Ochi no Iratsume as part of a political marriage to tie the Kurayamada’s side of the family to the Royal Prince as he challenged the head of the Soga family: Soga no Emishi and Soga no Iruka. Uno no Sarara was born the same year that Iruka and then Emishi were both killed by Naka no Ōe and his supporters. It seems unlikely she would have been born much earlier, if the dating of the Nihon Shoki is correct, since the marriage alliance is noted in an entry for the first month of 644. Even if they consummated the marriage immediately, the earliest date we would have for the birth of Uno no Sarara is one year earlier—everything else just makes her even younger.

That means that Uno was still quite young when her grandfather, Ishikawa no Maro, was accused of plotting treason and killed himself rather than letting himself be taken captive by Naka no Ōe’s forces. We are told that Ishikawa no Maro’s daughter, Miyatsuko no Iratsume, died of grief when she heard about her father’s death. That “Miyatsuko no Iratsume” appears to be similar to another name we have for Ochi no Iratsume, suggesting that they are one and the same. So at a young age, Uno no Sarara had lost her mother and maternal grandfather.

Next, in 657, she is said to have been given in marriage to her uncle, Naka no Ōe’s brother, Royal Prince Ōama, along with at least one of her sisters. She was only 13 years old. In 661, Queen Takara Hime, aka Saimei Tennō, died, leaving Uno’s father, Naka no Ōe the de facto head of government while her husband, Ōama, was the next in line—the Crown Prince. Then, in 662 she gave birth to a son, Royal Prince Kusakabe.

When Ōama retired from the position of Crown Prince, giving it to Naka no Ōe’s son, Ōtomo, and took Buddhist vows, retiring to Yoshino, Uno no Sarara went with him.

The Jinshin no Ran and Ōama’s reign

Uno no Sarara stayed close to her husband and supported him throughout the fighting with the Afumi court. She was 28 years old. She fled to the east with him, and it is said she mingled with the troops and that she helped with the planning of the war. When they were finally victorious, she continued to support her husband on the throne.

She is described as sitting on the dais with her husband during matters of state, and she was one of those who went to Yoshino to pledge to support each other—members of the royal family. When Ōama grew too ill to properly run things, he handed over the reins of government to Uno no Sarara and her son, Crown Prince Kusakabe. When he died in 686, Uno no Sarara would have been 42 years old.

Uno no Sarara quickly consolidated power. She eliminated Royal Prince Ōtsu, a rival to Crown Prince Kusakabe, and for several years they mourned Ōama. But then Prince Kusakabe died in 689, leaving behind a ten year old daughter and a seven year old son. So Uno no Sarara took the throne herself, and ruled for another eight years.

Kiyomihara Codes

The Kiyomihara Codes, named for the palace of Asuka-Kiyomihara. It was delivered in twenty-two volumes, and though it is not extant we can surmise certain aspects. For example, the definition of court bureaus and the definition of the Jingikan—a bureau of Kami Matters that is rather distinct to Yamato and which was separate from the Dajokan, or Grand Council of State. It was just the laws—not the punishments—but it was still a significant advancement of the Ritsuryō system.

Fujiwara-kyō

Also at this time we see the completion of the Fujiwara capital. This was designed as the first continental style capital—and the first continental style city—in the archipelago. It was built in a Confucian style, but with local imagery in the form of the sacred mountains of Mt. Unebi, Mt. Kagu, and Mt. Miminashi, all of which feature in stories from the “Age of the Gods”. In the center of the Fujiwara capital was the Fujiwara Palace—a new, grand palace built to be the seat of an imperial-style government.

Amaterasu and Ise Shrine

Another thing we see at this time is the rise in prominence of Amaterasu as the chief kami of the Heavenly Plain, Takama-no-hara. The story of Ise is told throughout the Chronicles, at various points, but there are plenty of indications that it was not preeminent, and may not have been the primary shrine of Yamato until this point. Even as recently as the reign of Naka no Ōe do we see that it is the god of Mt. Miwa, Ōmononushi, who is brought to the environs of Ōtsu to be worshipped. In the reigns of Ōama and Uno no Sarara, the ancient shrine of Miwa is rarely talked about, despite all of the attention lavished on shrines and kami worship more generally. There is even some thought that the establishment of the Jingikan itself may have had something to do with Ise. More of that in Part II….

Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan. My name is Joshua, and this is episode 152: Queen Uno no Sarara, Part 1
It was rare that something would pull people from the fields at the height of the season, but it wasn’t every day that people of Iga had the opportunity to watch a true royal procession. They gathered on either side of the street as the parade passed through town. There were horses and carts, but also just numerous men carrying various bags and provisions. There were also military guards, decked out in their finest—just in case anyone got any ideas. There were also various nobles and government officials, riding with her. The outfits and color would have been striking, particular to those who had little business with the court. And at the height of it all was a covered palanquin. Nobody could see the royal presence inside through the screens, though later they would talk about getting a peek of her hair or her robes. It didn’t matter, the procession itself was enough of a spectacle for all to see.
Not everyone was pleased. A few of the more dour elders complained about how much of a disruption and a distraction it was. They would at least be somewhat mollified by the news that, for enduring the disruption, they would at least get a break on their taxes that year.
The procession was headed east, to the land of Ise. Apparently they were going to pay their respects at the shrine there. Did you know that it was dedicated to the ancestor of the royal family itself? The actual sun goddess herself, Amaterasu. Some of the elders shook their heads. They remembered when everyone had been focused on Mt. Miwa, to the west. And what about this Buddha that had shown up from overseas? There were temples to him popping up all over the place. They weren’t so sure about all of this, but they knew their local kami and their local priests, who helped with the local harvests, and that was enough for them. The court and their fancy learning could figure out what the country needed, but they were going to stay focused on the day to day, instead.
Here we are, in the reign of Uno no Sarara, widow of Ohoama and mother to the late Prince Kusakabe, known to history as Jitou Tennou. We’ve actually been in Uno’s reign for several episodes now, but while we’ve talked about how that reign began and the roles a lot of other people played in that beginning, this episode I would finally like to start focusing on her—who she was, where she came from, and what she did. Since that covers a lot of ground, we are going to cover some of her history up to this reign, and we’ll be mostly focusing on two major updates—the creation of the new capital of Fujiwara, aka Fujiwara-kyou, and the increased royal patronage of Ise, which is thought to have been responsible for the ascendancy of Amaterasu as the paramount kami of the pantheon of Shinto kami.
So let’s start at the very beginning. It is traditionally held that Uno no Sarara was born around 645 to Naka no Oe and Soga no Ochi no Iratsume. Ochi was the daughter of Soga no Kurayamada no Ishikawa no Maro, cousin to the powerful Soga no Iruka. Naka no Oe’s marriage to Ochi no Iratsume and her sister, Mehi no Iratsume, had been part of a strategic alliance with Ishikawa no Maro, who helped him overthrow his cousins and institute the Taika Reforms. We talked about all of that back in Episode 106, as well as subsequent podcasts after that covering the next several reigns.
So 645 is about the earliest Uno no Sarara may have been born, the very start of the Taika era, when her father began instituting a lot of changes based on continental practices. She would have grown up in the inner buildings of the Asuka court during this time of immense change. She was probably a bit young when the Toyosaki palace was first built, though she may have remembered when the court abandoned it and moved back to Asuka.
Unfortunately, when she was only five years old, tragedy struck. Ishikawa no Maro, who had been made the Udaijin, or Minister of the Right, was slandered by his own brother, Soga no Himuka, and in return, Naka no Oe sent a force to have him punished. When he saw he could not get away, Uno no Sarara’s grandfather, Ishikawa no Maro, took his own life. The Nihon Shoki—written, I should note, at least partly under the direction of Maro’s granddaughter—claims that evidence came to light demonstrating his innocence, and he was posthumously exonerated.
Maro’s daughter, Miyatsuko no Iratsume, was so saddened by all of this that we are told she died of a broken heart. Miyatsuko no Iratsume appears to be another name for Ochi no Iratsume, and if so, it would mean that Uno no Sarara lost both her mother and grandfather when she was only five years old due to the actions of her own father. This sounds to me like it should be some kind of villain origin story.
From there, she was likely taken care of by her aunts and other women in the palace, at least until 657. It was about that time, at the age of 13, that she was married off to her uncle, Prince Ohoama. We don’t have a precise age for Ohoama, but he was likely no more than 5 years younger than Uno’s father, Naka no Oe, and some estimates suggest he was in his late 20s or early 30s, taking to wife his 13 year old niece. I can’t help but think, here, of the Heian period novel, the Tale of Genji, where the titular character, Genji, finds Lady Murasaki and marries her at the age of 10.
Uno no Sarara would have grown up in her uncle-husband’s home, and she was still young when the entire realm was placed on a war footing.When the court moved to Kyushu in 661 for the prosecution of the war on the continent, Uno no Sarara went with her husband, and a year later gave birth to their son, Prince Kusakabe. She was probably about 18 years old at the time.   I suspect that means She probably knew about her grandmother, Takara Hime, passing away, something that the inner circle of the royal family had attempted to keep relatively quiet for fear of disrupting the war effort.
Soon after her own son was born, news came back that the forces on the continent had lost. Baekje had fallen, and Yamato could be next. She would have traveled with her husband and the rest of the court back to Asuka and, eventually, up to Ohotsu, where her father now ruled with his brother as his right-hand man and heir to the throne.
At this time, Uno no Sarara was no stranger to politics. While her husband was in line for the throne, she knew that her brothers were also potential claimants, once they came of age. The Nihon Shoki disqualifies them through their parentage, but we see that didn’t stop the Afumi court from rallying behind Prince Ohotomo. There was also the royal princes Kawashima and Shiki. Prince Takeru would have technically been a potential threat as well, had he not died, tragically, at only eight years of age.
Now, technically, some may have been more in line than others, but Uno no Sarara knew how her own father had jumped the line, displacing her late uncle, Furubito no Oe, and it was clear something similar might happen this time around. There were also likely a few indications that not everything was great between her father and her husband, although you would hardly know it from the number of her siblings that were also residing in the north chambers of his residence.
Things came to a head in 671. At this point, Uno no Sarara was in her late 20s with a 10 year old son, and it was looking, for a moment, like her father, despite his illness, might have Ohoama killed to pave the way for Naka no Oe’s own son, Uno’s brother, Ohotomo. When Ohoama surprised everyone and stepped down, taking the tonsure, she was the only one to follow him. We don’t know if this is because she was that loyal to her husband, or because she had no other options. If her mother had taken her own life after her grandfather’s death, she may have had nobody but her father, Naka no Oe, to turn to, and he was clearly doing poorly. If she stayed, then she would be relying on the goodwill of Prince Ohotomo and others while looking after the nine year old son and heir of Ohoama, who was clearly persona non grata at court.
In contrast, one of Ohoama’s other consorts, Munakata no Amago no Iratsume would have had the Munakata family to fall back on, should she need it, and her son, Prince Takechi, was a bit older. In addition, Uno’s sister, Ohota no Himemiko had passed away earlier, in 667, and it is unclear who cared for her son, Prince Ohotsu, who was only a year younger than Uno’s son, Kusakabe. However, he, too, appears to have remained at the Afumi court with his caretakers.
So Uno no Sarara went to Yoshino with her husband. From this point on, Yoshino would become an important place for her, and during her own reign she would frequently make visits to the palace there, sometimes just for a couple of days at a time.
After Naka no Oe’s death, and the entire conflict of the Jinshin no Ran that kicked off in 672, Uno stayed by her husband’s side. She and Kusakabe made the incredible overnight journey from Yoshino to the other side of the Kii Peninsula, eventually setting up in Mie. Ohoama would continue on towards Fuwa pass, where his son Takechi was already stationed with loyal soldiers. Before that, however, he is mentioned as turning towards Ise—towards Amaterasu. The implication seems to be that he was praying for victory. It is also notable that a large part of his support was coming from the East and from areas around Ise.
Little is mentioned of Uno’s role in the record of the Jinshin no Ran, but in the opening to her reign there is a mention that she addressed the troops and mingled with the throng, until at last they formed a plan. This seems to indicate that she was involved in the planning, at least, for the prosecution of the war. On the one hand she was placed well behind the front lines. On the other hand, she was well positioned to assist with logistics. Troops and supplies from the north could come down and be redirected to the south depending on what was needed, and communications would likely be more secure through that area fully controlled by Ohoama’s troops. It is easy enough to imagine Uno no Sarara taking a role, even if it isn’t explicitly mentioned. The fact that she is mentioned as much as she is suggests to me that she had plenty to contribute to the war effort.
As the war of 672 came to a close, Ohoama had to move from a war footing to one of peacetime governance. As he ascended to the throne in 673, Uno no Sarara was made his queen. And in light of the recent issues, Ohoama appears to have leaned heavily on her and other members of the royal family for support.
And so Uno no Sarara was not just a delicate flower sitting in the hinter palace, waiting on her husband. She was an active participant in the government. When Ohoama called the various princes down to Yoshino and had them swear to uphold and support each other, she was included in their number. And the Chronicles explicitly mention that when the princes swore to uphold each other, Ohoama swore he would also support them, and then Uno no Sarara made her oath like his. That is interesting in that she isn’t included in the five princes, but rather with the sovereign, her husband. It appears she approached this from the point of view of a ruler already. Or perhaps she was not considered to be in the line of succession, and the focus was on upholding the various princes. Either way, we see how that eventually turned out.
Later, when starting the project for what is believed to be the Kiyomihara codes, she was seated on the dais with her husband, indicating that she certainly was involved in various matters of state. She also gave and received presents from the various nobles, including suits of clothing, gold, and more. When Ohoama grew ill, and could not carry out the functions of the government alone, he deferred matters to her and to the Crown Prince, presumably meaning her son, Prince Kusakabe.
Now Kusakabe is recorded as being made Crown Prince, and thus heir to the throne, however, it has also been suggested that this might not have been the case. Some have suggested that Prince Ohotsu may have been the actual Crown Prince, and that he wasn’t plotting against Kusakabe and his mother, but rather it was the other way around, with Uno no Sarara clearing him off the field to make room for her son.
Ohotsu, remember, was the son of Ohoama by way of Ohota-hime, who was a full sister to Uno no Sarara. That meant that, from a strict bloodline perspective, Ohotsu had just as much of a claim to the throne as did Kusakabe, but Kusakabe was a year older—or so the Nihon Shoki, compiled under the reign of Uno and her successors, would have us believe. We are also told that Uno was formally designated as Ohoama’s queen—but again we have that from the Nihon Shoki, which is more than a little bit biased.
Personally, I feel this theory that Uno no Sarara plotted to have Ohotsu removed without anything else stretches some of what we know, but it does illustrate that Uno no Sarara had a vested interest in ensuring that the crown went to her own progeny. I’d be more inclined to believe that there was some movement a foot, even if it was perhaps not quite as treasonous as the response to it would warrant.
And this catches us up with much of what we know. Ohotsu was executed, but then Kusakabe passed away, and so Queen Uno no Sarara became Tennou in her own right.
Things hadn’t gone exactly to plan, but she still had her grandson, Prince Karu, the late Kusakabe’s son, whose mother, Princess Abe, was a younger-half sister to Uno no Sarara. Abe was the daughter of Naka no Oe and Mehi no Iratsume, making Abe another grand-daughter of Soga no Kuramayada no Ishikawa no Maro. She was also 17 years Sarara’s junior and only a year older than the late Kusakabe. By all accounts, it seems that Abe and Sarara got on well together, though she is not as prominent in the narrative that we have in the Nihon Shoki. Still, she had an important role, not in terms of governance, but in terms of ensuring that the line continued. She was in charge or protecting and raising young Prince Karu until he was ready to take the throne. In so doing, she would no doubt have had a front row seat to Queen Uno’s own efforts.
Since Uno no Sarara had already been so involved with the government, it should come as no surprise that she continued many of the efforts attributed to her husband. In fact, you’ll often find references to Temmu and Jitou side-by-side to describe what happened because very few things can be attributed to just one of the two, especially given how long some of these projects seem to have taken. That said, there were some differences. While Ohoama, aka Temmu Tennou, had relied primarily on members of the royal family following the Jinshin no Ran, Uno was much more likely to rely on trusted nobles, whose position at court was largely held thanks to the patronage of the royal family. Having nobles running things again, rather than handing over power to those of the Princely class, may have provided opportunities for those noble houses to once again flex and grow their political muscle, but it was either that or hand that same power over to other princes with claims to royal descent—princes who might encourage the court that it would better if they, themselves, were to succeed the Queen, rather than the young prince, her own actual bloodline. Even the loyal Prince Takechi, who seems to have supported her and Prince Karu as best he could, could easily have become a threat. This could be one of the reasons she held on to power as long she did. It was, after all, a deliberate choice on her part. She could have had someone else step in as regent, but she chose not to.
We’ve talked about Uno’s dealings with Silla and the continent at this time. That was back in Episode 148, when we talked about how Ohoama was mourned and how Yamato dealt with the early missions. We discussed, thenhow she berated the Silla envoys for not adhering to protocol and turning them away. She also met with Emishi and Hayato embassies, which only helped to cement Yamato’s place as the central hegemony over the archipelago and all those living on the islands.
At first, this was just an extension of what she and Kusakabe had been doing since Ohoama had first grown ill and handed over the reins of government. But then Kusakabe died—and life went on. Later, Kusakabe would be remembered as Okanomiya Tennou and the Nagaoka Tennou. While not counted in the formal lineage, he was still granted the title “Tennou” posthumously, likely to help legitimize his son and that lineage. And yet, despite this, there is no report of a eulogy or anything similar upon his death. Even Royal Prince Ohotsu, when he was killed for threatening Kusakabe’s own ascendance, is given a fairly wordy entry full of praise for his virtues and how he was remember. For Kusakabe we get silence. Things just move on.
Indeed, just two weeks after the Crown Prince’s death, we get orders talking about given people four holidays each month. It seems a rather banal announcement coming the same week that the Crown Prince passed away.
And banal it may be, but I do want to pick at it a bit. I think it helps us understand even more the life at that time. In most of the world, today, we have become accustomed to the western concept of a week with seven days, including two holidays every week—though we just refer to it as the weekend. Saturday and Sunday began as holy days—the Sabbath in Jewish and then Christian tradition. Even Judaism only had a single day of rest every seven days. Many cultures did not have the concept of a weekend. After all, there wasn’t anything particularly special about one day or the other. A lunar month is just under 30 days—alternating between 29 and 30 days depending on various factors. Five would fit into that much better than four seven day weeks and two more days. Or divide it into two 15 day periods, more or less. Or three weeks of ten days each. In fact, that is what was popular in the Tang dynasty at the time—though a seven day week had crept in through Buddhism, which had been picked up on the Indian subcontinent thanks to Hellenic influences. This seven day week, which is now used in modern times, was originally used more by astronomers. The days corresponded to the Sun, the Moon, and the visible planets.
The point is, there’s no such thing as a natural weekend. At some point, the Tang court introduced a rest period every five days for court officials. In Yamato, it seems that they introduced four holidays. Specifically, the local governors were to give laborers—those conscripted as corvee labor—four days every month. It doesn’t mention if they are spaced out, or at what intervals, and it was specifically for laborers. I should probably also mention that, at this time, there wasn’t a concept of a “9-to-5” job. Sure, the court operated on a schedule that may have fit fairly well in our modern life, other than its extremely early start due to the lack of cheap, safe artificial light sources. Most people, however, especially in the agricultural sectors, were likely working from sunrise to sunset, when necessary. There was no concept of overtime or a forty hour work week. You worked when you needed to work, and that was it. No time cards, just life, punctuated by holidays, festivals, market days, and whatever else needed to happen. Oddly, in our modern, more regular work schedule we work both more and less, in some ways, than our ancestors did.   Our labor often goes into things beyond our job—everything from taking care of our home to various hobbies that we enjoy. Giving laborers time off from their endeavors was no doubt something they appreciated, but I don’t know how much of an impact it had on things long term.
A more interesting endeavor comes a few months later. That is when Uno had a royal commission come together as commissioners of “good words”. We mentioned this before, especially when talking about Kose no Tayasu, who had been part of this commission, though he was the lowest ranked of the bunch. At the top it was headed by Prince Shiki, a half-brother to Uno, and one of those who had pledged his loyalty with other members of the royal family down in Yoshino, though at the time Shiki was only about 11 years old. He was the son of Koshi no Michi no Kimi no Iratsume, and a brother to Prince Osakabe. In 689, when he took charge of this commission from his half-sister, he would have been in his 22nd year, so this was probably one of his first major assignments.
We don’t have a finished product that we can point to from this project, so there isn’t a clear idea of exactly what the commission did. Aston believed that they were attempting to determine auspicious words to be used by the court. By this one could infer that they were looking into the way to draw up formal language for edicts, or how to formally address the sovereign and members of the court. However, others have suggested that this was more about finding stories and other such things and writing them down. If that is the case, this may have been a continuation of—or perhaps an addendum to—the history project started during the reign of Ohoama. The words, or stories, that the commission wrote down were likely used by later Chroniclers, though there is no specific work that is clearly attributed to their efforts. So in the end we can’t exactly know for sure.
What we can see is that Uno no Sarara was continuing to make tweaks and changes to things—and in particular in how things were stated, remembered, and passed down to posterity, one way or another. This is also part of what we see later that same month, when the 22 books of what we now call the Kiyomihara Law Codes were also published. Like the history project, this was also begun during the reign of Ohoama, and Uno had continued to see it through. It appears to have been just the law itself, not necessarily the punishments which made up the other half of the Ritsuryou, but it is still significant. Unfortunately, we don’t know exactly what was in it—the earliest law code that we have good evidence for is the Taihou code, which would come over a decade later—but we have seen some of the edicts and orders and we can make some assumptions based on later law codes as well as the language used to even define the court and how things ran. Much of what was written had likely been promulgated, previously, and a lot of this may have been more documenting the changes they had already put in place.
There is also the Afumi law code, but there are even more questions about that one. This is possibly the first one written down to this level of detail. Though it would be superseded, later, it was still an impressive work.
As in past reigns, we see things both monumental and mundane. A month after the law codes were finished, we see about orders to the Mayors of the Left and Right to set up places for Archery—literally glossed as “Ikusa”, or “war”, but likely because the two had a common root and archery and war were closely intertwined. As for the Mayors of the Left and Right, this is the first time we are seeing those terms, and I suspect they are also part of the reforms that Uno no Sarara and her late husband had been implementing. The Mayors of the Left and Right of the Capital are known as Kyoushiki or, alternatively, as Misato-zukasa. They were like kokushi, or governors, except they oversaw the capital city. Now remember, the quote-unquote “capital city” in use at this point is Asuka—it is the Kiyomihara palace and environs. There were other streets, buildings, and such around, but nothing terribly organized. Most family estates were off in their own lands or strongholds. At the same time, the court was building out a new, permanent capital. It was taking time—and likely had been put on hold during the three year mourning period for the late Ohoama Ohokimi. It required that they survey and transform an immense and populated area into a new and impressive capital in the area known today as Kashihara. This work took years—they likely had to divert labor to build the late sovereign’s mausoleum, or misasagi, and there were droughts and other reasons why they may have had to pause work. And yet, it continued, nonetheless.
The main ideal for a capital city was based off of continental models. While Luoyang may have been the more active capital, the western capital of the Tang dynasty, at Chang’an—modern Xi’an—appears to have been a more quintessential capital city layout, and may have been what the Yamato capital was attempting to mimic—though they may have also been relying on the theoretical Confucian model, as well. In fact, I tend to think that the Confucian model was closer to this first attempt at a permanent capital. Early on, excavations assumed that the palace structures were towards the northern end of the city, but further investigations have suggested that the scale of Fujiwara-kyo was much more ambitious, and some maps of the area place the palace towards the center of the city. Either way, there were several key things about the capital and how it mimicked the continental models. One of the primary things that Yamato had appropriated from across the strait was the north-south orientation of the palace, with the main audience hall facing south, so as to get the sun. This meant that, from the point of view of the sovereign in that hall, the left side would be the east and the right side would be to the west. And so the capital city was divided into a left and right, east and west, and each half had its own administrator responsible for taxation, public safety, and general law and order. They were, as I said, similar to the governors of the various provinces in the scope of their powers, except that they oversaw the capital city.
The building of the Fujiwara capital is perhaps one of the most obvious changes that Uno no Sarara was overseeing. As I’ve mentioned before, it was a physical manifestation of court. The three sacred mountains which were included within the boundaries of the capital were woven into the myths and legends that would find their way into the Nihon Shoki and the Kojiki. The size and scale of the earthworks and the stones laid as foundation demonstrate that this was clearly meant to be a permanent capital, overturning the idea that there would be a huge change every time a sovereign passed away. Instead, there would be consistency. The order of the state would go on.
Later we’ll talk about reasons why the Fujiwara capital was abandoned. For now, though, let’s look at what we see about its construction.
In 690, the same year that Uno ascended to the throne, Royal Prince Takechi, Ohoama’s oldest son, inspected the site where the new Fujiwara palace was to be placed. Two months later, Uno no Sarara came out to see it for herself. I imagine this as being the point where the land had been cleared, and they could see the mountains and the placement and get an idea of the overall size of what they were looking for. With royal approval, the project continued.
A year later, in 691, officials were sent to perform the Chin-sai, the pacification ceremony, for the new capital. Today, this is a common ceremony, known as a Jichin-sai, or Earth Pacification Ceremony, done before undertaking a construction project. Theoretically it is before breaking ground on the project, though there is often some amount of preparation that has to be done in preparation. The idea for the Jichin-sai is to effectively negotiate with the spirits of the land before disturbing the area, a recognition that the process of construction is going to alter the natural landscape. As such, one wants to propitiate the spirits and the kami that are on the land to ensure that the construction is successful. This was likely a much older ritual, but this is the first mention we have of it in the record. This ceremony was also apparently directed at the new capital as a whole, while a year later another ceremony was held specifically for the new palace complex. In the intervening time we see the court laying out the roads and giving land for the various mansions of court nobles, like Tajihi no Shima’s four chou of land—roughly ten acres. Those of Jikikwoni rank and above were given two chou, and those from Jikidaisan down were given one chou. Those of Gon rank on down would get land dependant on the number of inhabitants in their fiefs. First class fiefs would get one chou, while second class would warrant a half chou and at the bottom they would get one quarter chou. This was apparently the land that they were being given in the capital to build their personal residences. Other land was given out for markets, temples, and other necessary facilities, but this whole city really was being built from scratch.
Shortly after the pacification ceremony for the palace, officials were sent out to the major shrines of the time. This included the great gods, the Ohokami, of Ise, Yamato, Sumiyoshi, and Kii. So not just the local kami, but also the larger kami who were seen as the kami of the archipelago more generally.
It would still take another year to build the palace. Uno visited the site a few times during the construction, with her last visit just a quick outing on the 8th month of 693. At that point it was likely ready, though she wouldn’t formally move into the new palace until the first month of 694. Before that, though, there was one other thing that had to happen. In the 2nd month of 693 they had to rebury the bodies.
That’s right. The Fujiwara capital occupied a huge swath of the plain of what is now known as Kashihara. And that plain had been settled for centuries—all through the kofun period. And those kofun, and possibly even older funkyubo, the older mixed-use burial mounds—would have been destroyed in the making of the new capital. There also may have been plain pit burials that were dug up while laying out roads and foundations. I don’t know that there was anything approaching the size of the larger, keyhole shaped mounds, but we have no way to know for certain how many were there that had to be destroyed or moved. I also have not seen any indications of any mass reburial site—whether they opened an existing tomb or simply dug a pit in the ground somewhere. I imagine that such a find would be incredible, but unless archaeologists stumble upon it, I guess we’ll never know. Still, it is interesting, and almost poetic as we move further and further from the kofun period, this feels like the final nail in the proverbial coffin, if you’ll forgive the pun. Indeed, when Uno no Sarara finally passes away, she will become one of the first sovereigns to be cremated, with her ashes and burnt remains then deposited in the existing tomb with her husband, Ohoama, rather than having a new mounded tomb built. Buddhist style cremation would eventually become commonplace throughout the archipelago, though sovereigns would still have special mausoleums built for their memory, it really was a change from the ancient practices.
From 694 onward, the court would meet at the new Fujiwara Palace. Compared to previous palaces, I can only imagine how impressive this one must have seemed. Based on what we can tell, it was likely built much more in the continental style. Previous palaces had largely been in the style of the archipelago, with what we believe was plain wood and a thatched roof. The Fujiwara palace was likely a mix, but with more of the continental style than the previous Kiyomihara place. It also dwarfed its predecessor, at over twice the size. It was actually much closer in size and shape to the Toyosaki palace, in Naniwa. At the southern end of the palace was the Suzaku mon, the Suzaku gate, followed by the choshu-den’in, a courtyard with two buildings, one in the east and one in the west, where officials could wait and prepare for the day. From there they would be let into the Chodoin, a large court yard with four buildings on the east and west, and four more at the southernmost point. These would be where the various departments, or bureaus, would operate. There were also gates in the east and west of the Chodoin for easier access. To the north was another gate, leading to the Daigokuden, the main audience hall. This would have been quite the impressive and imposing structure—the main focus of the palace. It was in its own walled enclosure, and would have been the seat of the sumera Mikoto, or Tennou. It was both inside and apart from the Dairi, the inner palace. This was the actual residence of the sovereign and the royal family. The dairi itself occupied more land than the entire Kiyomihara palace. None of the buildings exist, but we can see their footprint from the large foundation stones and there are numerous rooftiles and other architectural features that fell off or were removed and then buried, purposefully or not, allowing us to get some idea of the size and scale of the project.
And yet, it appears that this palace may not have been completed when they moved in. The entire city was likely still under construction, in fact. The main pieces were in place, but to build an entire city from scratch took a lot of work. Most of the buildings would have been built with more traditional—and less labor intensive—practices. You didn’t need a false second story gallery some thirty feet off the ground, even if you were the Minister of the Right. It was enough to have a relatively simple mansion with gardens, servants quarters, and everything else needed to keep you comfortable. That in and of itself was going to put a strain on labor and other resources.
And so it looks like some parts of the galleries and other features may not have been finished even while Uno no Sarara was there. In fact, it may not have been fully finished by the time they moved again. The Fujiwara capital, the first permanent capital city, was only occupied from 694 until about 710—less than two decades. This massive project, taking multiple years and how many people to create, would be abandoned several years later. The buildings would be torn down and moved to the new site—Heijou-kyou, in modern Nara city. And yet, the impact of Fujiwara kyou would remain.
Besides making changes to the physical landscape, Uno no Sarara was also focused on the spiritual landscape as well. Both Ohoama and Uno not only supported the Buddhist temples, building new temples and leveraging the ceremonies, but they also supported the traditional kami. During the Jinshin no Ran, Ohoama turned and addressed the kami of Ise before heading to the Fuwa barrier. Later we see a greater focus on Ise Shrine, with Saigu, the royal princesses sent to Ise Shrine as the Shrine priestess, being heavily reported. In fact, the position seems to have not been commented on much until this reign, and there is some thought that Ohoama and Uno actually instituted the practice—or at least made it a formal part of the court and the royal household. This is combined with their support of the Jingikan, the state governmental body responsible for dealing with kami matters. At this time it appears to have been even more powerful, in many ways, than the other bureaus or departments of the Great Council of State, the Dajokan.
There are plenty who argue that the preeminence of Ise was born in this period. Early Yamato worship focused more on the deity of Mt. Miwa: Ohomononushi. Sun worship seems to have also been baked into the rituals of the ethnic Wa people, but that wasn’t necessarily focused on Amaterasu—and Amaterasu was not necessarily seen as a feminine goddess. Early worship appears to focus on the deities such as Takabi Musubi, and similarly named deities. These are deities that show up in court ritual, and presumably date back to well before this period. Thanks to the fact that we get alternate stories in the Nihon Shoki, we occasionally see them take a more central role in events, such as the descent of the Heavenly Grandson, but at the same time we also see that the main throughline of the Nihon Shoki and the Kojiki has placed Amaterasu more front and center in the narrative.
Ama Terasu effectively translates to something like “The Shining of Heaven”. In neither the Japanese nor Sinitic language is she particularly gendered most of the time, and this may have been a more generic name for the concept of a sun deity.   I believe it is also somewhat telling that the Ichi-no-miya, the First Shrine, or primary shrine, of Ise is not Ise Shrine, but rather Tsubaki Grand Shrine, which is the home of Sarutahiko Ohokami. Even in the Nihon Shoki, there is a narrative regarding the yata no kagami, the great mirror, that it was moved from its original location in the Nara Basin over to Ise and the shrine was then established there, marking the shrine as a relative late-comer to the region rather than marking a particularly ancient spot. The Great Kami of Ise then appears to have taken on some of the shine, pun intended, of Sarutahiko, who is no longer seen as a sun-deity, and is even placed in the way of the Heavenly Grandchild’s descent—perhaps a subtle nod to some of the tensions between the worship of one over the other.
Besides sending the Shrine Princess, the Saigu, to Ise, the sovereigns themselves made plans to go, in person. Ohoama made preparations, including purifying himself, but his trip was cancelled due to a sudden death in the palace. He is never recorded as making the trip, after that. Uno no Sarara, however, did make the trip, in 692.
This was clearly quite the production, and requires several entries in the Nihon Shoki. The first entry is in the 2nd month of the year, when she makes her intentions clear. The Court officials were set to task to prepare all the necessary clothing for the trip, which was about 3 weeks out. This likely also meant preparing the road, ensuring that there would be food, and a place for Uno no Sarara and her entourage to stay when they reached Ise. The preparations clearly had an impact, as Miwa no Ason no Takechimaro, a Chunagon, or Middle Counselor, presented a memorial to remonstrate with her majesty on the trip. He noted that they were in the middle of the agricultural season—roughly April or May by modern standards—and a royal trip would have an outsized impact on the areas where she would be traveling through. His remonstration was heard, and overruled. Uno no Sarara was determined to go. As she delegated the Prince Hirose, Tahema no Mabito no Chitoko, and Ki no Ason no Yumibari to all look after the palace while she was away, Miwa no Takechimaro reiterated his remonstration and then took a drastic step: He offered to her his cap—basically he offered to resign his rank. This was quite the step, and not from nobody.
Miwa no Takechimaro was from a prominent family. As their name suggests, they were connected to Mt. Miwa, and the worship, there. Based on what evidence we have, he was probably born around 657 CE, and when he was about 16 years old he was fighting on the side of Ohoama in the Jinshin no Ran. In particular, he was involved in the fighting near Hashihaka kofun, and then moved over to attack the Afumi forces on the Middle Road. There is evidence after that of him making his way up through the ranks, and was even one of those who offered a eulogy for Ohoama. As Chunagon, he was in a fairly powerful position in court, and giving up his court rank would mean not just a loss in status, but also giving up the income associated with that rank.
And this remonstration may be why we are told that the court commuted taxes, including forced labor, for the lands that she passed through, and she recognized the local Kuni no Miyatsuko with cap-rank. She also remitted taxes for those who had been conscripted to help from elsewhere, such as her baggage handlers, the people who built the temporary palace for her to stay in, in Ise, etc. So even if the procession to Ise had an impact, she seems to have done her best to lessen the blow.
As for Takechimaro, we don’t see him again in the Nihon Shoki, but he does show up later. He would become the governor of Nagato, and then later he is given positions such as the Mayor of the Sakyou, or Left Capital. So it would seem that either his resignation wasn’t accepted, or that he was re-hired at some later point. He would pass away in 706 CE.
By the way, there is one other notable feature about him, and you may have caught it as I went over all of this. That was the name of his uji, or clan: Miwa, or Ohomiwa.    This means he had a connection to—and possibly a vested interest in—promoting the worship at Mt. Miwa, the traditional Yamato cultic center. Nothing is outright stated, but it makes sense that someone from Miwa might be a little bit concerned with the extra attention being given to the shrine at Ise around this time—so there is that, as well.
Regardless of his intentions, it certainly seems that from that point on Ise Shrine and the deity worshipped there, Amaterasu Ohokami, would be tied to the imperial line from the late 7th century onward. Clearly the royal patronage of the shrine stepped up, and for the most part we do see a fairly regular stream of Saigu, with one slight exception: There doesn’t appear to have been one during Uno no Sarara’s reign. Ohoku no Himemiko had been sent down during the reign of Ohoama, but she was the sister to Prince Ohotsu, and appears to have returned after his death. The position appears to have remained vacant until after Uno no Sarara’s reign. It makes me wonder if she wasn’t “filling in” for the Saigu, in a way. That could, in part, explain her travels there. There also may not have been a good candidate at the time, but I find that less believable—perhaps there was no candidate that Uno trusted given the precarious position her own bloodline was in at the moment. Still, after her reign, the position of Saigu would be regularly filled by a member of the royal family through the end of the Heian period. It was interrupted by the Genpei wars, and then the practice fell into decline during the period of the Kamakura bakufu. Late Edo period pro-imperialists tried to restore the practice, but it didn’t catch back on.
Despite the apparent importance of the shrine to the royal family, it would also remain somewhat aloof. The priests of the shrine would provide the sacred mirror for ascension ceremonies, but it would be very rare for any sitting sovereign to actually pay a visit to the shrine, and, as I mentioned before, Amaterasu was not one of the deities reflected in the inner court rituals. Still, she would come to be seen as the dominant kami of the Shinto pantheon, and even today, many shrines will hold space for her as well as the primary deity; home shrines, or kamidana, will often include ofuda for Amaterasu as a central point of worship, with kami associated with one’s local shrines as well.
So there you have just a little taste of what Uno no Sarara was up to. Whether she had intended to be in this position or had it thrust onto her, she was no shrinking violet. She took control of the ship of state and set a course that would continue to influence the archipelago down to the modern day. The reforms that started with her father and husband she continued and made manifest in the physical and spiritual world. And this is only the beginning. There is more to talk about regarding Uno no Sarara’s reign, and her eventual abdication, but for that, we will have to wait until Part 2.
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And that’s all for now. Thank you again, and I’ll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan.

References

Bentley, John R. (2025). Nihon Shoki: The Chronicles of Japan. ISBN 979-8-218634-67-4 pb
Teeuwen, Mark and Breen, John. (2017). A social history of the Ise shrines: divine capital. Bloomsbury Academic.
Duthie, T. (09 Jan. 2014). Man’yōshū and the Imperial Imagination in Early Japan. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004264540
Como, M. (2009). Weaving and binding : immigrant gods and female immortals in ancient Japan. University of Hawaiʻi Press.
Ooms, H. (2009). Imperial Politics and Symbolics in Ancient Japan: The Tenmu Dynasty, 650-800. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press. https://muse.jhu.edu/book/8316.
Aston, W. G. (1972). Nihongi, chronicles of Japan from the earliest times to A.D. 697. London: Allen & Unwin. ISBN 0-80480984-4.

Ise Shrine

Amaterasu Ōkami

Jingikan (神祇官)

Shintō

Rough Transcript

References

Early Life

The Jinshin no Ran and Ōama’s reign

Kiyomihara Codes

Fujiwara-kyō

Amaterasu and Ise Shrine

Rough Transcript

References