Japanese PantheonTemple
Izumo Taisha
One of the most ancient and important Shinto shrines, dedicated to Okuninushi, lord of the unseen world.
About Izumo Taisha
Okuninushi's great shrine
Izumo Taisha is the chief shrine of Okuninushi, the earth-god who cedes the land to Amaterasu's descendants in the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki. The kuni-yuzuri (land-cession) is the charter: he keeps the unseen world and marriage, they keep the political sky. The shrine's huge ancient pillars are archaeology; the myth is the handover. Kamiari-zuki, the tenth month when gods gather at Izumo, is a calendar note, not a novel.
On the map
Izumo Taisha among other places of the Japanese Pantheon.
Sources and further reading
Source notes
These references are recorded in the catalog. Their passage wording and translation have not been checked, so quotations are not displayed here.
- Kojiki (land-cession of Izumo)
About this entry
By Elizabeth Stein for Mythos Atlas. About the author. Editorial notes are grounded in the site's cited sources and can be challenged through the contact page.
Coordinates mark where the myths place a site, or where the tradition locates it today. Mythic realms are left off the map or marked as symbolic placements.
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