Kamowakeikazuchi Shrine (Kamigamo Shrine)

Kamowakeikazuchi Shrine is an ancient shrine in Kita Ward, Kyoto, widely known as Kamigamo Shrine. Its deity, Kamowakeikazuchi-no-Okami, is said to have descended onto Mount Koyama, 301.5 meters high and about 2 kilometers north-northwest of the shrine, and the largest rock at the summit is regarded as the stone of descent. In the shrine's myth, the child deity born after Kamo-Tamayorihime-no-Mikoto picked up a red-lacquered arrow in the river once rose to heaven, then came down onto Mount Koyama in response to a festival held to welcome him, and that festival is the origin of the shrine. In 677 the province of Yamashiro built the Kamo shrine buildings.

After the capital moved to Heian-kyo, the shrine was honored as a guardian of the capital and as the first shrine of Yamashiro Province, receiving visits and offerings from successive emperors, and from the Meiji era until the end of the Second World War it was ranked at the top of the government shrines of the highest grade. In 1036 a Shikinen Sengu renewal every 21 years was established. After the main sanctuary and other buildings burned in 1476, Tokugawa Hidetada built the shrine buildings in 1628 at the wish of Emperor Go-Mizunoo and Tofukumon-in. In 1994 the entire grounds of about 230,000 tsubo were inscribed as a World Cultural Heritage site.

The two National Treasure buildings are the Main Sanctuary and the Gonden. Identical buildings stand side by side, the Main Sanctuary on the east and the Gonden on the west; the Gonden is a permanent temporary sanctuary that serves as the main sanctuary during Shikinen Sengu. Both were rebuilt in 1863 (Bunkyu 3), the year Emperor Komei visited the shrine to pray for the expulsion of foreigners. They are in the nagare-zukuri style with cypress-bark roofs, and the shrine explains that this form is the prototype of the nagare-zukuri style used by about 60 percent of shrines in Japan. Both buildings have kagekoma, paintings of guardian lion-dogs by the Kano school from the Edo period. Most of the other shrine buildings were rebuilt in 1628, and 41 of them are Important Cultural Properties.

The Main Sanctuary and the Gonden stand in the inner court inside the Chumon gate, which is normally closed to visitors. On a special visit, a priest guides you to the Naoraiden hall for purification, and then you can go up to the front of the Gonden. The Takakura-den displays sacred treasures and items such as a votive painting of Emperor Komei's visit, which only special visitors can see. Photography and eating or drinking are not allowed, and the special visit is suspended around festivals, the Aoi Festival and the New Year, so the shrine asks you to contact its office before you go. During the spring and autumn Kyoto special openings of cultural properties not usually open to the public, and the summer Kyo no Natsu no Tabi campaign, the sanctuaries are shown as part of those programs and the regular special visit is not held.

The pair of sand cones, tatezuna, in front of you after passing through the second torii gate are modeled on Mount Koyama, with pine needles set at their tops. The shrine buildings spread over a triangular slope where the Omonoimi River on the east and the Mitarashi River on the west meet, and the main sanctuary is built facing Mount Koyama so that worship is directed toward the mountain. The metal fittings of the buildings are engraved with the shrine crest of futaba aoi (wild ginger leaves). The Kamo Kurabeuma horse race on May 5 began in 1093 when a horse-racing event at the imperial palace was moved here, and the Kamo Festival (Aoi Festival) is held on May 15. Tamayorihime-no-Mikoto, enshrined in the East Main Sanctuary of Shimogamo Shrine, is regarded as the mother of this shrine's deity.