Kawachi 33 Kannon Pilgrimage

     The Kansai area, at large, has had Saigoku Kannnon Pilgrimage with 33 temples since the 8th century.  In Kawachi Province, which now belongs to Osaka Prefecture, the reduced-size copy of the 33 Kannon Pilgrimage was organized with another set of 33 temples during Edo Period.

     Because of the unique character of Kawachi Province, Kawachi 33 Kannon Pilgrimage cannot classified as a domain-based pilgrimage although the 33 temples are distributed within a province.

     In the Edo Period, Kawachi Province used to be constituted with small estates and territories of the Tokugawa Shogunate, of the Shogun’s direct retainers, and of the absentee lords in distant domains such as Shimodate, Odawara, Numata, and Tatebayashi, and also comprised small domains such as Sayama and Tannan.

     The Sayama domain used to consist of only 28 villages in Kawachi Province, and the Tannan Domain with just 20 villages.  Thus, Kawachi Province wasn’t governed as a whole domain. That affected the way Kawachi 33 Kannon Pilgrimage was organized and revived.  To put it another way, it was organized and revived somewhat like a city-based pilgrimage.