Kamo Mioya Shrine

Two Sanctuaries of 1863 and Thirty-One Buildings of 1629

Kamo Mioya Shrine (賀茂御祖神社, Kamo Mioya Jinja), commonly called Shimogamo Shrine, is a shrine at Shimogamo Izumigawa-cho, Sakyo Ward, Kyoto City, whose thirty-three buildings, thirty-one raised in 1629 and two sanctuaries rebuilt in 1863, were designated Important Cultural Properties on 2 August 1901, with the east and west sanctuaries raised to National Treasure status on 31 March 1953. It belongs to the shrine.

The east and west sanctuaries date from the rebuilding of 1863 and are each three bays wide in the nagare style with cypress bark roofs. The other thirty-one buildings of 1629 include the tower gate and its east and west corridors, the middle gate and its corridors, the dance hall, the narrow hall, the bridge hall, the vestment hall, the offerings hall, the prayer hall, the east and west musicians' rooms, the storehouse, the sanctuary of the auxiliary Izumoinohe shrine, and the three sanctuaries, worship hall, gate and corridors of the auxiliary Mitsui shrine.

The Agency for Cultural Affairs records that the thirty-three were designated in two stages. This is the shrine commonly known as Shimogamo, of which twenty-four buildings had already been designated as a group; since all of those belonged to the main shrine, nine further buildings within the tower gate were added: the storehouse, the sanctuary of the Izumoinohe shrine, and the three sanctuaries, worship hall, gate and east and west corridors of the Mitsui shrine, all built in 1629 like the buildings already designated.

The forest of Tadasu no Mori in the precinct is a National Historic Site, and the shrine as a whole was inscribed in 1994 as a component of the World Heritage site Historic Monuments of Ancient Kyoto.

Three-Bay Nagare Style: Representative Sanctuaries of the Form

The east and west sanctuaries stand side by side, identical in scale and style. Three-bay nagare style means a sanctuary three bays across whose roof extends forward over the entrance step. The roof appears to flow forward, hence the name, and it is the form most widely used for shrine sanctuaries across Japan.

Cultural Heritage Online places the two, with the sanctuary and provisional sanctuary of Kamo Wakeikazuchi Shrine, as representative examples of the nagare sanctuary. They are of plain timber, with only the railings and steps in red lacquer. Though built at the end of the Edo period, they are held to preserve the older manner handed down through periodic rebuilding.

The west sanctuary stands to the left, the east to the right. The east enshrines Kamotaketsunumi-no-mikoto and the west Tamayorihime-no-mikoto. Tamayorihime is the mother of Kamowakeikazuchi-no-mikoto enshrined at Kamo Wakeikazuchi Shrine, and the name Mioya, the august parent, comes from that.

Periodic Rebuilding That Stopped in 1863

There is a reason the National Treasure sanctuaries carry so late a date.

According to Cultural Heritage Online, Kamo Mioya Shrine rebuilt its sanctuaries roughly every twenty years from 1036 to 1322. Unlike Kamo Wakeikazuchi Shrine, which rebuilt when damage required, this shrine rebuilt on a fixed cycle. War disrupted the practice, and in 1629 the shrine was restored and the Heian arrangement recreated.

After that restoration the sanctuaries were rebuilt once in the seventeenth century, three times in the eighteenth and three times in the nineteenth. The rebuilding of 1863 was the last. Designation as Important Cultural Properties in 1901 made the sanctuaries buildings to be repaired rather than replaced. In the modern period they were partly dismantled and repaired in 1913 and rethatched in 1973.

The present sanctuaries are therefore the last buildings that the system of periodic rebuilding produced. Sanctuaries that had kept their ancient form by being rebuilt again and again were stopped by designation and preserved as they then stood.

Why Thirty-Three Buildings Form One Item

The two sanctuaries alone are nagare-style buildings of 1863. The dance hall alone is a single building of 1629. Only with the thirty-three in view does the arrangement of the precinct since its restoration of 1629 become legible.

Beyond the tower gate stand the dance hall, the narrow hall and the bridge hall, and through the middle gate lies the sanctuary. The east and west corridors enclose that axis. The prayer hall, vestment hall and offerings hall support the rites and the running of the shrine, and the storehouse holds its treasures. The auxiliary Izumoinohe and Mitsui shrines sit within the larger complex as small complexes of their own, each with sanctuary, worship hall, gate and corridors.

The Agency added the nine auxiliary buildings to the twenty-four of the main shrine so that everything inside the tower gate could be treated as one construction of 1629. That the reasons given for the addition are only two, that the buildings stand within the tower gate and that they date from the same year, shows the precinct and the building campaign to be a single unit.

Only the two sanctuaries were raised to National Treasure status, because they alone carried the tradition of periodic rebuilding to its end and stand as representative nagare sanctuaries. The other thirty-one were never rebuilt and have kept their form of 1629 through rethatching and partial repair. Two ways of preserving buildings share a single precinct.

Visiting

Entering the precinct is free, and the gates open from 6:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The sanctuaries stand inside the middle gate and are normally worshipped from outside it. Within the middle gate are seven small shrines called the Kotosha, and the roofs of the sanctuaries are seen over the inner fence.

During periods of special worship, visitors may enter inside the inner fence. Check the official site for dates and charges. Photography is generally permitted in the precinct but prohibited inside the sanctuaries and during prayers.

The approach runs through Tadasu no Mori. The forest is separately designated as a Historic Site, and old trees line both sides of the path. Walking it before reaching the tower gate is part of the visit.

From Demachiyanagi Station on the Keihan line it is about 12 minutes on foot. Kyoto city buses stop at Shimogamo-jinja-mae and Tadasu-no-mori. From JR Kyoto Station, bus route 205 takes about 30 minutes.