Omi Shrine First Torii

The Gate at the Foot of the Approach

Omi Jingu Daiichi Torii (近江神宮第一鳥居, also written Ōmi Jingū Dai-ichi Torii), the first torii gate at Omi Jingu in Otsu, Shiga Prefecture, was erected in 1944 and was entered on the national register of Tangible Cultural Properties in 1998.

It stands at the entrance to the main approach, the point at which the public road ends and the shrine precinct begins. Visitors coming from Omi-jingu-mae station cross the railway and meet it head on. Timber construction, 7.3 metres wide.

A torii does one thing: it states where the sacred ground starts. This one also does a second job that its builders were conscious of, which is to be visible from a distance and tell people where the shrine is.

The Anatomy of a Myojin Torii

The form here is the myojin type, the more elaborate of the two great families of torii, and it is worth learning to read because once you can, you can date and classify gates all over Japan.

The topmost member curves. So does the beam immediately beneath it, called the shimaki or island beam, and the pairing of a curved upper member with a curved island beam is the signature of the myojin type; the plainer shinmei type has a straight upper member and no island beam at all.

The round posts lean very slightly inwards, a batter called uchikorobi. It is subtle enough that most people register it only as a feeling that the gate is stable. Through the posts runs a tie beam of square section, and between that beam and the members above sits the gakuzuka, the short strut at the centre that in many shrines carries a name tablet.

The gate belongs to the second construction campaign of 1944, four years after the shrine was founded in 1940 to enshrine Emperor Tenji, who moved the capital to Otsu in 667. The complex was planned within the Home Ministry's Shrine Bureau by Sunami Takashi and Tani Shigeo. Registration came on 9 October 1998 under number 25-0091, with the criterion that it serves as a model of design.

What to Look For

Approach on foot rather than by car if you can. The gate was designed to be walked through, and the change from public street to shrine approach is something you feel at the threshold rather than see from a windscreen.

Stand underneath and look up at the curve of the top member against the sky. Then compare it later with the second torii further up the approach, erected in 1940 and slightly smaller at 6.4 metres. Same form, different campaign, different scale.

Just beyond the gate stands the shrine's name post, whose calligraphy was written by Konoe Fumimaro, the first chairman of the association formed to establish the shrine and a former prime minister.

The torii stands in the open and can be seen and photographed at any time without charge; the grounds themselves are open 6:00 to 18:00. Omi-jingu-mae station on the Keihan Ishiyama-Sakamoto line is about nine minutes away on foot, roughly half of it once you are inside the precinct. Drivers approaching from the lakeside road come almost straight in from the Keihan level crossing, and there are 200 free parking spaces outside the New Year period.