Just a couple of kilometers along the coast from Sagiura is another tiny fishing village with a shrine that was both mentioned in the Izumo Fudoki and listed in the Engi Shiki.
The village Omiya Shrine enshrines a male-female pair of kami, Shinatsuhiko and Shinatsuhime.
According to the ancient creation myths, after Izanagi and Izanami created the Japanese islands they were covered in mist, so Izanagi created Shinatsuhiko to blow the mist away, therefore the pair are known as gods of wind. In the village they are known as gods for safe travel by sea.
This whole section of coast is really quite wild and beautiful with just small fishing settlements in the occasional cove. reminds me of Cornwall in many ways. According to the Kunibiki myth this section of the peninsular was created by taking land from Shiragi, the Korean kingdom known as Sila in English
assuming the last pic is modern, do people still live there? pretty ideal...though i'd probably sleep on the second floor
ReplyDeleteThe photo was about 6 years ago, so yes people still live there.... there is more of the settlement than what you see there, but not much more...
ReplyDelete