Virtual Tama Aqueduct Chichibu 34 Kannon Pilgrimage #8 Eiho-ji Temple

 

     Eiho-ji Temple used to be a shrine temple of Fudaten Shrine nearby, which was founded in the 8th or 9th century.  Fudaten literally means Cloth Plenty Heaven.  The city name Chofu itself means Tax Cloth.  The name Chofu dates back to the Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves, which was compiled sometime after AD 759

     In 840, the third official history book, Nihon Koki, was compiled, which covered the years 792-833.  Its volume 8 had an entry about a drifted alien:

     "In July, Autumn, 799, one man on a small boat drifted ashore in Mikawa Province.  He wore a full-length cloth, a loincloth, but not trousers.  He covered his left shoulder with a piece of dark blue cloth, which looked like a Buddhist priest’s sash.  He was about 20 years old, was about 167 centimeters tall, and had 10-centimeter-long ears.  We couldn’t understand his language, nor could we identify his nationality.  When Chinese people saw him, they said he was a Kunlun man.  Later, he mastered Japanese, and said he was from India.  He was always playing a one-string harp.  His singing voice was always melancholy and sorrowful.  When we checked his belongings, we found something like grass seeds.  He said they were cotton seeds.”

     In those days, Chinese called those from South-East Asia as Kunlun people.  The man might have been blown eastward somewhere in South China Sea, and washed on the Black Current as far as off Mikawa Province.

     The Kunlun man taught Japanese people how to grow cotton plants, and they made it, just for a year.  It was after the 16th century that Japanese people succeeded in growing cotton plants serially.  Until then, cotton cloth was a luxury imported goods from China and Korea.

     According to tradition, it was a farmer along Tama River who first succeeded in weaving cotton cloth in Japan.  Consequently, the area came to be called Chofu, namely Tax Cloth, if you believe it.

     The oldest record of trading cotton seeds in Musashi Province dates back to 1521, and that of cotton cloth back to 1571.  In 1574, Hojo Ujikuni (1541-1597) made a military rule to provide foot soldiers cotton clothes.  That implies the spread of the cotton cloth.

     Priest Yuyo organized Eiho-ji Temple into the Shingon Sect.

     In 1915, Eiho-ji, Hosho-ji, and Fudo-in Temples merged to form Taisho-ji Temple.

Taisho-ji Temple

Address: 1 Chome−22−1 Chofugaoka, Chofu, Tokyo 182-0021

Phone: 042-482-2370