Sugiyama Shrine Pilgrimage: Ooka River Travelogue (2)
Continuing from last time.
This time, I will visit the Sugiyama Shrines along the Ooka River basin.
Starting from the Sandanda Ruins.
I will descend all at once from an altitude of 55m to 3m down a long, long slope.
On the way, there was a slope with a nice view where you could see the Landmark Tower (though... I refrained from taking pictures because children were walking home from school). There were narrow roads that felt like old paths here and there, making it a delightful walking path.
Makita Sugiyama Shrine
When I came out onto Prefectural Road 21 (Yokohama-Kamakura Line) and was walking near Makita Station on the Subway Blue Line, a shrine name stone suddenly appeared.
Perhaps because it is along a main street near the station, it feels much more prosperous than other Sugiyama Shrines!
History
In the 3rd year of Jonin (AD 1209),Jogyo Hoin, the third son of Minamoto no Yoritomo (commonly known as Kamakura Hoin), invited the deity from Sugiyama in Toi, Izu Province to enshrine Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto for the protection of the Kamakura Shogunate's demon gate. At the time of its founding, this area was a sandbar where the base of the mountain protruded into the sea, and it was a seaside with a beautiful breeze.
Main Deities
Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
Amaterasu-Omikami
Ugamitama-no-Mikoto
Somehow... this is a pattern of enshrined deities not seen in the Sugiyama Shrines I have visited so far.
Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto
is a child of Amaterasu and one of the Munakata Sanjojin (Three Munakata Goddesses) deities. She is enshrined at Munakata Taisha and Usa Shrine. She is a truly grateful deity worshipped as a peerless beauty and a god of business prosperity, performing arts, financial luck, victory, good fishing, traffic safety, abundant harvests, and the sea.
Why did that deity become the main deity of a Sugiyama Shrine?
When I looked into it, it seems correct to consider that she was invited from Toi in Sagami Province rather than Toi in West Izu.
I have visited Toi in Yugawara Town before. Come to think of it, the official name of "Shitodo-no-Iwaya" was "Toi Sugiyama Cave"!
It is said that there was a shrine called the Seven Sugiyama Shrines that enshrined Ichikishimahime-no-Mikoto (Benzaiten) in Sugiyama, Toi-go, Sagami Province, which was associated with Minamoto no Yoritomo and Doi Sanehira, and that seven shrines were built for the purpose of protecting the demon gate of Kamakura. There are many Sugiyama Shrines in the Kanto region, and some view this as their root.
On August 17, 1180 (Jisho 4), Minamoto no Yoritomo, who finally raised an army with the help of Hojo Tokimasa, Doi Sanehira, and others, defeated Yamaki Kanetaka, the deputy of Izu Province, and won the first battle. However, he suffered a crushing defeat by the army of Oba Kagechika at the Battle of Ishibashiyama. With only seven followers, he fled into the mountains of Sugiyama, Toi-go, and was guided by the father and son Doi Sanehira and Doi Toehira, who held the territory, to hide in caves and hollows of large trees to evade the enemy's pursuers (the legend of the Noh play "Shichiki-ochi").
It seems there were seven small shrines in the Sugiyama area, which corresponds to the demon gate (kimon) of Kamakura, likened to the seven cavalrymen (Yoritomo himself + six loyal retainers). The website above suggests the "Seven Sugiyama Shrines = Sugiyama Shrine roots" theory, but since Sugiyama Shrine is an Engishiki-naisha (from the Heian period), its history is older than the Seven Sugiyama Shrines.
Are there many shrines nearby that enshrine Ichikishimahime?
There used to be a Sugiyama Shrine in the nearby Okamura (on the other side of the Sandendai ruins), but it was merged into another shrine during the Meiji period. The Okamura Tenmangu Shrine, where it was merged, includes Ichikishimahime-no-mikoto and Amaterasu-Omikami as enshrined deities, and it is thought that they were likely invited in the same manner as the Maita Shrine.
Okamura Tenmangu Shrine, which has been cherished by the local people as the "Tenjin-sama of Okamura," has an unknown founding date, but according to its history, a retainer of Minamoto no Yoritomo received a divided spirit from Kitano Tenmangu in Kyoto during the Kenkyu era (1190-1198) of the Kamakura period and founded the shrine here. In 1910, Sugiyama Shrine and the Grand Shrine were merged, and it came to be called Sugiyama Tenmangu, but in 1930, it was renamed Okamura Tenmangu, taking the name of the town that had been familiar for a long time.
Also, according to Hamarepo, there are multiple shrines in the Ooka River estuary area that enshrine Benzaiten, the honji-butsu (original Buddhist manifestation) of Ichikishimahime.
(Recently, I often cannot view Hamarepo articles because they get caught by browser security... is it just me?)
Ukanomitama-no-mikoto
is Ukemochi-no-kami (the god of food), and is said to represent the spirit of rice in particular. It is the main deity of Fushimi Inari Taisha and is widely worshipped as Inari-san. So, was that why the shrine was red?
It is unclear how these gods came to be worshipped, but if a "peerless beauty," the "supreme god of heaven," and the "goddess of food" are brought together, there is no doubt it would be a shrine with the best blessings.
Ooka River
It is a bit late, but since this is an Ooka River travelogue, I will touch upon the Ooka River.
Ooka River is a second-class river that originates in Hitorizawa-cho, Isogo-ku, Yokohama City, Kanagawa Prefecture (Hitorizawa Citizens' Forest) and flows into Yokohama Port. The name of the upper reaches is Sasage River. It joins the Hino River near Konan-chuo-dori, Konan-ku, and becomes the Ooka River. Flow path length: approx. 12 km (of which, about 8.5 km is designated as a second-class river). During the Edo period, until the reclamation work for the Yoshida Shinden at the river mouth was carried out, most of the lower reaches was an inlet called Ooka Bay (Maita Bay).
I have strolled through Hitorizawa Citizens' Forest before. In the middle of a new town residential area on a hill, that corner alone was a nature-rich forest zone, and despite being within Yokohama City, it had quite a sense of being a headwater.
Topography of the Ooka River basin
https://www.pref.kanagawa.jp/documents/10592/768793.pdf
The Ooka River springs from the middle of Mt. Enkai (153m above sea level) and reaches the sea in just 12km. Looking at the cross-section, even at Kami-Ooka in the densely populated middle reaches, the riverbed gradient is quite steep. To confirm the elevation near the source, I created a cross-section diagram myself.
The upper and middle reaches are rapid, while the lower reaches are completely flat. The area sandwiched between the Ooka River and the Nakamura River was a shallow inlet called 'Shukan no Minato' until the beginning of the Edo period.
The Ooka River and History
As seen in the Sandenda Ruins, there were prehistoric shell mounds and settlement sites in the Ooka River basin. What was the history of the Ooka River basin after that?
Kamakura Kaido Shimo no Michi
The middle reaches of the Ooka River run parallel to the 'Shimo no Michi' (Lower Road) of the Kamakura period.
Maoka → Higiri→ Saido (Kami-Ooka) → Gumyoji → Idogaya→ Hodogaya → Katabira
The road along the bay had good access to Kanagawa Minato and Kozukue Castle, and it is thought to have been an important road even after the Kamakura period.
Lowland Development Continuing from the Edo Period
Since the early modern period, development of the lower reaches and the river mouth has flourished.
The area surrounded by the Ooka River and the Nakamura River was a valley-like terrain sandwiched between the Nogeyama hill to the north and the diluvial plateau of Yamate (about 40-50m above sea level) to the south. It was an inlet that became a drowned valley due to the Jomon transgression. Villages were formed where sandbars extended at the mouth of the bay (such as Yokohama Village and Noge Village), and people lived by cultivating small fields or opening salt pans in the inlet.
An Edo lumber merchant who noticed that this inlet was suitable for reclamationYoshida Kanbeiobtained permission from the Edo Shogunate in 1656 to carry out reclamation and new rice field development. He built a
tide-prevention embankment(shioyoke-tsuzumi) near the current Kannai Station to prevent seawater inflow, but it collapsed and washed away due to stormy weather. Thinking that a sturdy stone embankment that would not collapse from waves was necessary, he resumed construction in 1659. The stone walls for the tide-prevention embankment were transported from Awa and Izu. It was completed in 1667, and he named the new rice fieldNoge Shinden. Yoshida Kanbei built a house in this area and lived there, and his descendants continued to live there for 11 generations. In 1669, Tokugawa Ietsuna praised his achievements, renamed the new rice field
Yoshida Shinden, and allowed Yoshida to have a surname and wear swords.
This is 'Yoshida Shinden,' which every child in Yokohama learns about in elementary school.
Canals were developed after the Meiji era, and the area prospered through water transport. It can be said that this was the prototype of Yokohama.
In summary...
From the prehistoric era when the Sandan-yama ruins flourished as a settlement, to the medieval period when major government roads passed through, the early modern period when it bustled with lowland development, and the modern era when it developed as the port city of Yokohama, the Ooka River may have always been a river at the forefront of the times.
Flood Damage and the Ooka River
On the other hand, this region was also one plagued by flood damage.
The Ooka River, where the Hino River and Sasage River converge, was said to be so winding and prone to flooding at the time that it was called the "Ninety-nine Bends," and it is said that it caused disasters by flooding countless times in the past. Furthermore, due to the accumulation of volcanic ash from the Hoei eruption of Mount Fuji in the Edo period, the Ooka River was dammed up in various places, causing water to overflow into fields and causing immense damage to the surrounding villages.
Since the 1960s, large-scale residential development such as Yokodai and Konandai has progressed rapidly, leading to a significant increase in runoff and frequent flooding. For this reason, as a flood control measure, the Ooka River diversion channel was constructed to discharge Ooka River water directly into Negishi Bay, and since its completion, no major flood damage has occurred downstream from the diversion channel.
Ooka River Diversion Channel
The diversion channel has a total length of 3,637 meters and a diversion capacity of 415 cubic meters per second, and is composed of two tunnels (Hino River Tunnel: 1,269m length, 8.9m inner diameter; Ooka River Tunnel: 1,298m length, 10.6m inner diameter), an open channel, and an intake basin.
I really like this illustration. You can see at a glance the river environment of the Ooka River and the convenience of Yokohama as a city on the water.
[Reference]
Stories of Rivers, 9th Edition: Ooka River (Ooka River Diversion Channel and Use of River Space)
River Planning Division, Road Bureau, Yokohama City
Outline of the Ooka River River Regeneration Plan Kanagawa Prefecture
Ota Sugiyama Shrine
Let's move on. If you cross the Ooka River and go along the side of Yokohama Commercial High School...
Beyond the main street, there was a torii gate!
Two families were visiting for their baby's shrine visit today as well. Ah, that's right! Suitengu is also enshrined here. I remember going to Suitengu in Nihonbashi to get a maternity belt when I was pregnant with my first child.
History
When Yokohama was being developed as Yoshida Shinden, the area suffered from frequent flood damage. Therefore, during the Jōkyō era (1684–1687), a branch of Suitengu was invited from Kurume to the area now known as Chojamachi and enshrined as a guardian deity against flood damage.
After the shrine building was constructed and restored in the early Meiji period, it gathered people's devotion as a guardian deity for safe childbirth and child-rearing. However, it was completely burned down in the Great Yokohama Air Raid in 1945. The shrine grounds were also requisitioned by the occupation forces. Later, a temporary shrine was built on the property of a parishioner of Sugiyama Shrine, and rituals were performed by the priests of Sugiyama Shrine. In 1998, it was welcomed into Sugiyama Shrine as a joint deity and enshrined together.
Sugiyama Shrine is enshrined as the general tutelary deity of the former Ota Village. Its origin is unknown, but it is believed to have been enshrined to honor the achievements of Yamato Takeru's eastern expedition. Although building records from the reconstruction of the shrine in the 2nd year of Eiwa (1376) remained, the shrine building (built in the 7th year of Bunka), the shrine office, and even the trees in the precincts were all burned down in the Great Yokohama Air Raid. In 1958, while barracks were still standing, the shrine building was constructed through the efforts of the parishioners and completed as a symbol of hope for post-war reconstruction.
I see, so that is why Suitengu was jointly enshrined.
What was the old Sugiyama Shrine like?
Sugiyama Myojin Shrine
Exempt land, five ken by nine ken, highway located at the foot of the western mountain. It is the village's tutelary deity. A torii gate is built in front, the main shrine is five shaku by four shaku five sun, and the outer hall is four ken by three ken, facing southeast. The deity is in the form of a court noble, about five sun long, and the original manifestation is Yakushi. It is one shaku two sun long, and the annual festival is on September 12th. Upon consideration, it is said that the Sugiyama Shrine in Yoshida Village, Tsuzuki District, is listed in the Engishiki Jinmyocho. There are many shrines with the same deity in the neighboring villages. They must all have been invited from that deity. It is maintained by Daikoin Temple within the village, and there are two shrines, Tenjin and Inari, on the left and right of the main shrine. Also, there are two buildings, Daijingu and Konpira, on the mountain where the shrine stands.
In this description of the Fudoki Ko, the author seems to recognize that 'the Sugiyama Shrine in Yoshida Village is an Engishiki-naisha.' Was it shared among the compilers at the time that the Sugiyama Shrine in Yoshida Village (Shin-Yoshida Shrine, Kohoku Ward) was a leading candidate?
However, the deity of Shin-Yoshida Shrine is Isotakeru-no-Mikoto, and the deity of Ota Shrine is Yamato Takeru.
As for the origin of the invitation, Hoshikawa Shrine, which also enshrines Yamato Takeru, might be more convincing.
Location
Checked the Meiji Rapid Survey Map to see the old topography.
Let's also look at the Konjaku Map.
Both Ota Shrine and Makida Shrine were located near the old Kamakura Kaido.
Nowadays, Suitengu is more...
Looking at the Ota Sugiyama Shrine website, Suitengu is listed first, and the URL even contains "suitengu." Although the enshrinement took place in 1998, which is relatively recent, Suitengu, the deity of safe childbirth and child-rearing, has become more famous, and the original Sugiyama Shrine has faded into the background.
(Perhaps it's a case of lending the eaves and losing the main house...)
I had no idea about the deities enshrined at Suitengu, but it includes Emperor Antoku, Kenreimon-in, and Nii no Ama (those who perished by drowning after being defeated at the Battle of Dan-no-ura). To think that from that tragedy, they became deities who protect children... (tears)
I'll stop being petty about it.
Since Suitengu was enshrined here, Sugiyama Shrine is also prospering along with it.
Children are the treasures of the world. I'm sure the deity of Sugiyama Shrine will also place the children in cedar boats that float well and protect them forever and ever!
Next time, I'll cross the mountain to the other side!