Nothing is known about Fukuju-in Temple. However, its surrounding area has 114 ancient tumuli, which were supposed to have been built between the 6th and 7th centuries. The largest one, the Iwaya Tumulus, is located in Kamifukuda, and is the largest in Japan among those built in the 7th century, when building tumuli had already stopped where the central government was located. Those tumuli around Kamifukuda were supposed to have been built by heads of the powerful families who ruled the area between Lake Inba-numa and the Ancient Katori Sea. They included Itsukori, Morosumi, Taketatehiko, Oshiiwa, Ukizu, Kaguhi, Kaseo, and Hirosuki. Their blood relationship was unknown. At first, they built tumuli on the hillside which face Lake Inba-numa, and then they started building their tumuli on the hill side facing the Katori Sea. They became extrovert. In the first half of the 7th century, they built Ryukaku-ji Temple . They followed what the central government did. The area around Fukuju-in Temple was a holy place since prehistoric times, but what holiness meant for the local ruling people might have not been the same for the ordinary people.
Kaseo's son, Mukohe, was recorded to have become a governor of Inba County. When Ushikai was the governor of Inba County, he presented military provisions to Emperor Kanmu (737-806) in 781 to support the central government's aggression on the Tohoku Region. Promoted by the local supports, the emperor invaded the Tohoku Region three times. The first invasion in 789 led by Ki Kosami (733-797) was crushed by the northern people. The second invasion in 794 led by Otomo Otomaro (731-809) was not bad, thanks to his deputy, Sakanoue Tamuramaro (758-811). the third invasion from 801 to 802 led by Tamuramaro was a victory. He brought back to Kyoto 500 captives including their 2 leaders, Aterui and More, who were both beheaded on August 13, 802.
On the southern coast of Katori Sea, there stood Katori Shrine. Katori Shrine used to be the gateway to the Kanto Plain, and governed the water transportation around Katori Sea. Hasetsukabe Atahiohohiro of Inba County, Shimousa Province, expressed Katori Sea in a tanka poem which was included in the Ten Thousand Leaves, the oldest collection of Japanese poetry:
A wave suddenly washed over a bow. The draft unexpectedly fell over me.
After the poem, he had to go far away to Kyushu as “sakimori” to defend Japan.
Katori Sea has been named as such by today’s historians. It used to be called “Uchi-umi” (literally: Inland Sea), “Nagare-umi” (Flowing Sea), or “Nasaka-umi” (Reverse-waving Sea). The Kinu River ran into the sea along with other smaller rivers such as the Kobai and Hitachi Rivers.
Katori Sea was largest about 10 thousand years ago. More than 80 dugout canoes have been excavated in the Kaiso area alone, which bordered south on Katori County. The number 80 corresponds to about 40% of all canoes excavated in Japan. The area around Katori Sea still has more than 100 place names which have either “fune”, “funa” (boat), or “tsu” (port).
Katori Shrine ruled 24 ports in Shimousa Province, and 53 ports in Hitachi Province. Scatters of medieval documents suggest that the shrine governed sea people there as fishermen and as sailors, and even put up some river checkpoints along the rivers which ran in the Kanto Plain. the shrine had even sea checkpoints at least at today’s Katsushika in Tokyo Prefecture and Gyotoku in Chiba Prefecture both at the end of the Edo Bay. Those checkpoints collected tolls and taxes, which, in Western Japan, pirates along the Seto Inland Sea did. It is unknown when Katori Shrine was founded but it had built up the network of its branch shrines in the Kanto Region by the beginning of the 8th century. Building the deprivation system in the Kanto Region, the local powerful families were making eyes at the Tohoku Region.
On January 11, 802, the central governmant ordered 4000 young people from Suruga, Sagami, Kai, Musashi, Kazusa, Shimousa, Hitachi, Shinano, Kozuke, and Shimotsuke Provinces to emigrate to the Tohoku Region as farmer-soldiers. They might have moved north with thier eyes glaring on colonial profit.
Address: 9 Kamifukuda, Narita, Chiba 286-0842
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In 780, Sakanoue Tamuramaro (758-811) was chasing a deer in Mt. Otowa, and met Kenshin, who was training. In 791, Tamuramaro was dispatched to the eastern provinces to prepare for the war against the aliens in the northeastern part of Honshu Island. In 794, he invaded the region, with the military successes of beheading 457 and taking 150 captive. During the war, he recognized Vaisravana and Ksitigarbha as effective. It is unknown where he met the two. In or around the capital? In the eastern provinces on his way to the northeastern region? For example, in Musashi Province? Or in the northeastern region itself?
In 798, he built Kiyomizu-dera Temple for the Sahasrabhuja statue, put the statues of Vaisravana and Ksitigarbha on sides, and invited Kenshin as the priest. The two deities on sides of the main deity were supposed to guard the main deity. In 801, he invaded the northeastern region again. When Tamuramaro brought back two enemy chiefs, Aterui and More, to the capital in 802, the two were killed against Tamuramaro’s intention to have them keep working as chiefs in the northeastern region of the unified country. He was given a priest, probably to pray for the war dead on both sides. The death of the two was very effective. It satisfied the central government. And yet it didn’t bring about avenging battles. The two died as if to guard something or somebody else.
It might have been Tamuramaro who brought timber from Mt. Otowa, had a statue carved, and left someone confined in Terayama Village. Or that somebody could have stayed there willingly to pray for the dead.
The temple name Jigan literally means loving eyes. What did the eyes actually see with love?
They sent 4000 young men from the Kanto Region to the Tohoku Region. That could bring about significant imbalances of the proportion of young women and men in the 2 regions. How did they bring back the equilibrium?
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