Virtual Edo Bando 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #10 Nezu Shrine

 

     Emperor Otarashi dispatched his son, Prince Ousu, to the Kanto Region to bring people there under control.  The prince founded a shrine to enshrine Susano, the god of war, in Sendagi.

     Ota Dokan (1432-1486) presented its main building in the 1470's.

     Tokugawa Tsunashige (1644-1678) had a villa in Nezu.  He had his concubine, Hora, live in the villa, and she gave birth to Ienobu (1662-1712) there.

     In those days, people valued placenta and many parents buried it under the ground.  Upper-class people built a mound over the buried placenta.  In Okazaki, Mikawa Province, the mound for the placenta of Tokugawa Ieyasu (1542-1616), still exists.  Tsunashige and Hora buried the placenta of Ietsuna in their garden and put cut stones over it.  When Ietsuna became the 6th shogun, the villa became an important place to guard his placenta.  They moved the shrine in Sendagi there to enshrine Susano as Ietsuna’s ubusunagami, the deity that controls or protects his birthplace.  The precincts still have a well which provided water to bathe Ietsuna for the first time after his birth.

     Till the end of the Edo Period, Eleven-faced Ekadasamukha was believed to have become Susano in Japan to enlighten and cultivate Japanese people.  Hence, an Eleven-faced Ekadasamukha statue used to be enshrined in Nezu Shrine's precincts, commonly known as Kiyomizu Kannon.

Address: 1 Chome-28-9 Nezu, Bunkyo City, Tokyo 113-0031

Phone: 03-3822-0753