Virtual Kubota Castle Town 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #1 Kumano-san Kannon-do Hall

 

     Kumano-san Kannon-do Hall is located in the precincts of Kumano Shrine. 

     When either Sagisaka Ukonnojo or Shirasaka Ukonnojo came to Izumi Fortress in 806, his chief retainer, Shimizu Mondo, brought Zao Gongen from Kinpusen-ji Temple in Mount Yoshino.  Ukonnojo is the job title of the 3rd officer of the Guardsmen.  Mondo is the job title of an official of the Waterworks Bureau.

     Zao Gongen is the syncretic deity of Sakyamuni, Eleven-Faced Ekadasamukha, and Maitreya.

     The Sagisaka Family is, usually speaking, from somewhere around Sagisakanaka, Iwata, Shizuoka 438-0004.

     Sagisaka Rokurozaemon became subject to Tokugawa Ieyasu (1542-1616) after the Imagawa Clan fell into a decline.  He killed Magara Naozumi (?-1570) in the Battle of Anegawa, which was fought between the allied forces of Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582) and Ieyasu, and the combined forces of the Azai and Asakura Clans on July 30th, 1570.

     The Shirasaka Family was from Shirasaka Village, Shirakawa County, Mutsu Province (today's Shirasaka, Shirakawa, Fukushima 961-0835).

     Using their job titles as their name sounds more like samurai, and the year 806 sounds too old to be true.  In 804, Akita Castle was reorganized into Akita County.

     Izumi means Spring.  As Kumano Shrine was founded in its present place in 1795, some people could have immigrated to the foot of a hill which has a spring with their Kumano Shrine and built a fortress near the spring.

     Izumi Fortress used to be located where Kumano Shrine is.  When Ando Sanesue (1576-1660) ruled the estuary of Omono River, Izumi Gensai was based in the fortress.  Presumably, the Izumi Family ruled Izumi Village, based in Izumi Fortress.

     When the Holocene glacial retreat was at its height about 6,000 years ago, the Akita Plain was under the sea.  The sea level lowered and the coastal dunes were formed.  The Akita-Plain area became a lagoon.  Gradually, the lagoon was filled with sediment to become marshland.  It is unknowable what the Akita Plain looked like when the Akita Castle was built.  It might have been built either on a headland in a lagoon or on the heights surrounded by marshes with Omono River running about it.  The Izumi area was at the foot of hills with fresh water gushing out along the border between the hills and the marshes.

     Senpuku-in Temple is a Shingon Buddhist temple that was founded by Kumano ascetics on Mount Goan in the early Edo Period.  The seated statue of Mahavairocana, which was enshrined during the Muromachi Period is a prefectural designated tangible cultural property, and the 190-centimeters tall Acalanatha standing statue, which is the temple's principal deity, is a city designated tangible cultural property.  Senpuku literally means Spring Fortune.

     Some say the Kubota Castle Town #1 is Kannon-do Hall of Kumano Shrine and others say it is Senpuku-ji Temple.  Anyway, the spring could have been a holy or, at least, important place either for indigenous people or newcomers.

     I wonder why Hiranoya Jinbei chose the holy place as the #1.  Was he the offspring of the Izumi Family or the founder of Kumano Shrine?

Kumano Shrine

Address: Goanzan-28 Izumi, Akita, 010-0816

Phone: 018-868-4672

Senpuku-in Temple

Address: Izumimitakene 1-48, Akita, 010-0812

Izumi Fortress Site

Address: Goanzan-25 Izumi, Akita, 010-0816

Kinpusen-ji Temple

Address: 2498 Yoshinoyama, Yoshino, Yoshino District, Nara 639-3115

Phone: 0746-32-8371