1.
Izumo-taisha
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Izumo-taisha, also Izumo Ōyashiro, is one of the most ancient and important Shinto shrines in Japan. No record gives the date of establishment, located in Izumo, Shimane Prefecture, it is home to two major festivals. It is dedicated to the god Ōkuninushi, famous as the Shinto deity of marriage and to Kotoamatsukami, the shrine is believed by many to be the oldest Shinto shrine in Japan, even predating the Ise Grand Shrine. A style of architecture, taisha-zukuri, takes its name from the hall of Izumo-taisha. That hall, and the buildings, were designated National Treasures of Japan in 1952. According to tradition, the hall was much taller than at present. The discovery in the year 2000 of the remains of enormous pillars has lent credence to this, several other buildings in the shrine compound are on the list of Important Cultural Properties of Japan. Amaterasu was much pleased by this action and she presented Izumo-taisha to Ōkuninushi, at one time, the Japanese islands were controlled from Izumo, according to Shinto myths. Izumo, known as the realm of gods or the land of myths, is Izumo-taishas province and its main structure was originally constructed to glorify the great achievement of Ōkuninushi, considered the creator of Japan. Ōkuninushi was devoted to the building of the nation, in which he shared many joys, in addition to being the savior, Ōkuninushi is considered the guardian god and god of happiness, as well as the god who establishes good relationships. According to the Nihon Shoki, the sun goddess Amaterasu said, From now on and you shall cast a spell of establishing good relationship over people to lead them a happy life. I will build your residence with colossal columns and thick and broad planks in the architectural style as mine. The other gods were gathered and ordered by Amaterasu to build the palace at the foot of Mt. Uga. This was due to early Shinto cosmology, when the people believed the gods were above the world and belonged to the most extraordinary. Therefore, Izumo-taisha could have been an attempt to create a place for the kami that would be above humans, before being known as Izumo Ōyashiro or Izumo-taisha, the shrine was known as Okami-no-miya in Izumo, Itsukashinokami-no-miya, Kizuki-no-Oyashiro, Kizuki-no-miya, or Iwakumanoso-no-miya. Evidence of the original Grand Shrine has been found, for example, part of one of the pillars for the structure was found, three cedar trees with a three-meter diameter at its base. It is on display at the shrine, during the Kamakura era, around 1200, the main structure was reduced in size. Then in 1744, the shrine was reconstructed to the present size of 24 meters high and 11 meters square at its base, in the 18th and 19th centuries, as travel became more common in Japan, the shrine became a central place of pilgrimage
2.
Shinto
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Shinto practices were first recorded and codified in the written historical records of the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki in the 8th century. Still, these earliest Japanese writings do not refer to a unified Shinto religion, practitioners express their diverse beliefs through a standard language and practice, adopting a similar style in dress and ritual, dating from around the time of the Nara and Heian periods. The word Shinto was adopted, originally as Jindō or Shindō, from the written Chinese Shendao, the oldest recorded usage of the word Shindo is from the second half of the 6th century. Kami are defined in English as spirits, essences or gods, Kami and people are not separate, they exist within the same world and share its interrelated complexity. Shinto is the largest religion in Japan, practiced by nearly 80% of the population, Shinto has 81,000 shrines and 85,000 priests in the country. According to Inoue, In modern scholarship, the term is used with reference to kami worship and related theologies, rituals. In these contexts, Shinto takes on the meaning of Japans traditional religion, as opposed to religions such as Christianity, Buddhism, Islam. Shinto religious expressions have been distinguished by scholars into a series of categories, Shrine Shinto and it consists in taking part in worship practices and events at local shrines. Before the Meiji Restoration, shrines were disorganized institutions usually attached to Buddhist temples, the current successor to the imperial organization system, the Association of Shinto Shrines, oversees about 80,000 shrines nationwide. Folk Shinto includes the folk beliefs in deities and spirits. Practices include divination, spirit possession, and shamanic healing, some of their practices come from Buddhism, Taoism or Confucianism, but most come from ancient local traditions. Sect Shinto is a designation originally created in the 1890s to separate government-owned shrines from local organised religious communities. These communities originated especially in the Edo period, the basic difference between Shrine Shinto and Sect Shinto is that sects are a later development and grew self-consciously. They can identify a founder, a set of teachings. Sect Shinto groups are thirteen, and usually classified under five headings, pure Shinto sects, Confucian sects, mountain worship sects, purification sects, and faith-healing sects. Koshintō, literally Old Shinto, is a reconstructed Shinto from before the time of Buddhism, today based on Ainu religion and it continues the restoration movement begun by Hirata Atsutane. Many other sects and schools can be distinguished, Kami or shin is defined in English as god, spirit, spiritual essence, all these terms meaning the energy generating a thing. Since the Japanese language does not distinguish between singular and plural, kami refers to the divinity, or sacred essence, that manifests in multiple forms, rocks, trees, rivers, animals, places, and even people can be said to possess the nature of kami
3.
Typha
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Typha /ˈtaɪfə/ is a genus of about 30 species of monocotyledonous flowering plants in the family Typhaceae. Other taxa of plants may be known as bulrush, including some sedges in Scirpus, the genus is largely distributed in the Northern Hemisphere, where it is found in a variety of wetland habitats. Evidence of preserved starch grains on grinding stones suggests they were eaten in Europe 30,000 years ago. Typha are aquatic or semi-aquatic, rhizomatous, herbaceous perennial plants, the leaves are glabrous, linear, alternate and mostly basal on a simple, jointless stem that bears the flowering spikes. The plants are monoecious, with flowers that develop in dense racemes. The numerous male flowers form a spike at the top of the vertical stem. Each male flower is reduced to a pair of stamens and hairs, large numbers of tiny female flowers form a dense, sausage-shaped spike on the stem below the male spike. In larger species this can be up to 30 centimetres long and 1 to 4 centimetres thick, the seeds are minute,0.2 millimetres long, and attached to fine hairs. When ripe, the heads disintegrate into a cottony fluff from which the seeds disperse by wind, Typha are often among the first wetland plants to colonize areas of newly exposed wet mud, with their abundant wind dispersed seeds. Buried seeds can survive in the soil for long periods of time and they germinate best with sunlight and fluctuating temperatures, which is typical of many wetland plants that regenerate on mud flats. The plants also spread by rhizomes, forming large, interconnected stands, Typha are considered to be dominant competitors in wetlands in many areas, and they often exclude other plants with their dense canopy. In the bays of the Great Lakes, for example, they are among the most abundant wetland plants, different species of cattails are adapted to different water depths. Well-developed aerenchyma make the plants tolerant of submersion, even the dead stalks are capable of transmitting oxygen to the rooting zone. Although Typha are native plants, they can be aggressive in their competition with other native species. They have been problematic in regions in North America, from the Great Lakes to the Everglades. Native sedges are displaced and wet meadows shrink, likely as a response to altered hydrology of the wetlands, an introduced or hybrid species may be contributing to the problem. The most successful strategy appears to be mowing or burning to remove the aerenchymous stalks and it may be more important to prevent invasion by preserving water level fluctuations, including periods of drought, and to maintain infertile conditions. Typha are frequently eaten by mammals such as muskrats, that also use them to construct feeding platforms and dens
4.
Tegillarca granosa
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Tegillarca granosa is a species of ark clam known as the blood cockle or blood clam due to the red haemoglobin liquid inside the soft tissues. It is found throughout the Indo-Pacific region from the eastern coast of South Africa northwards and eastwards to Southeast Asia, Australia, Polynesia and it lives mainly in the intertidal zone at one to two metres water depth, burrowed down into sand or mud. Adult size is about 5 to 6 cm long and 4 to 5 cm wide and it has a high economic value as food, and it is kept in aquaculture. Just on the coast of Zhejiang Province alone, blood cockle plantations occupy around 145,000 mu of mudflats and these clams are raised in the river estuaries of the neighboring Fujian Province as well. The meat of this bivalve is served steamed, boiled, roasted, although blood clams are considered one of the more delicious Chinese delicacies, the style of preparation in Shanghai involves quick-boiling them, leaving many of the viruses and bacteria present. A full-color guide to 3,300 of the world’s marine bivalves, a status on Bivalvia after 250 years of research. 901 pp.1 CD-ROM FAO Profile, including production figures and range
5.
Koto (instrument)
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The koto is a traditional Japanese stringed musical instrument derived from the Chinese zheng, and similar to the Mongolian yatga, the Korean gayageum, and the Vietnamese đàn tranh. The koto is the instrument of Japan. Koto are about 180 centimetres length, and made from kiri wood and they have 13 strings that are usually strung over 13 movable bridges along the width of the instrument. There is also a 17-string koto variant, players can adjust the string pitches by moving the white bridges before playing. To play the instrument, the strings are plucked using three finger picks, otherwise known as plectra, the character for koto is 箏, although 琴 is often used. However, 琴 usually refers to another instrument, the kin. 箏, however, many times the character 箏 is used in titles, while 琴 is used in telling the number of kotos used. The ancestor of the koto was the Chinese zheng and was first introduced to Japan from China in the 7th and 8th century, the first known version had five strings, which eventually increased to seven strings. This particular instrument is known throughout Asia but in different forms, the Japanese koto, which is a relative to the Chinese zheng, the Korean gayageum, and this variety of instrument came in two basic forms, a zither that had bridges and zithers without bridges. When the koto was first imported to Japan, the native word koto was a term for any. Over time the definition of koto could not describe the variety of these stringed instruments. The azumagoto or yamatogoto was called the wagon, the kin no koto was called the kin, the modern koto originates from the gakusō used in Japanese court music. It was a popular instrument among the wealthy, the instrument koto was considered a romantic one, some literary and historical records indicate that solo pieces for koto existed centuries before sōkyoku, the music of the solo koto genre, was established. According to Japanese literature, the koto was used as imagery, in one part of The Tales of Genji, Genji falls deeply in love with a mysterious woman, who he has never seen before, after he hears her playing the koto from a distance. Perhaps the most important influence on the development of koto was Yatsuhashi Kengyo and he was a gifted blind musician from Kyoto who changed the limited selection of six songs to a brand new style of koto music which he called kumi uta. Yatsuhashi changed the Tsukushi goto tunings, which were based on gagaku ways of tuning, and with this change, Yatsuhashi Kengyo is now known as the Father of Modern Koto. A smaller influence in the evolution of the koto is found in the inspiration of a woman named Keiko Nosaka, Keiko Nosaka, felt confined by playing a koto with just 13 strings, so she created new versions of the instrument with 20 or more strings. Japanese developments in bridgeless zithers include the one-stringed koto and two-stringed koto, around the 1920s, Goro Morita created a new version of the two-stringed koto, on this koto, one would push down buttons above the metal strings like the western autoharp. It was named the taishōgoto after the Taishō period, at the beginning of the Meiji Period, western music was introduced to Japan
6.
Seven Lucky Gods
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The Seven Lucky Gods or Seven Gods of Fortune are believed to grant good luck and often have their place in netsuke engravings or in other representations. Amongst the seven, not all the gods are mythical characters and they all began as remote and impersonal gods, but gradually became much closer canonical figures for certain professions and Japanese arts. During the course of its history, the influence between gods has created confusion about which of them was the patron of certain professions. The worship of this group of gods is also due to the importance of the seven in Japan. These gods have been recognized as such for over a thousand years ago by a number of followers. In the beginning, these gods were worshiped by merchants as the first two of them were gods of business and trade. In ancient times, these gods were worshiped separately, but it happens today – only when it is required for the god to act on behalf of the applicant. The Seven Gods of Fortune started being mentioned as a collective by the year 1420 in Fushimi, in order to imitate the processions of the Daimyo, shortly after a famous artist of the time, Kano Yasunobu, was ordained to portray these gods for the first time ever. From the period of the gods Izanami and Izanagi, Ebisu is the one whose origins are purely Japanese. He is the god of prosperity and wealth in business, and of abundance in crops, cereals and it is now common to see his figure in restaurants where fish is served in great quantities or in household kitchens. Daikokuten is also one of the Shichifukujin and he is the god of commerce and prosperity. There are other characteristics which have also attributed to him, such as being the patron of cooks, farmers, bankers. This god is characterized by his smile, having short legs and he is usually depicted with a bag full of valuable objects. Daikokuten originated as a conflation of the Buddhist death deity Mahākāla with the Shinto deity Ōkuninushi. The Japanese name Daikoku and the Hindi name Mahakala both translate to Great Blackness, per the Butsuzōzui compendium of 1690, Daikoku can also manifest as a female known as Daikokunyo or Daikokutennyo. His origins can be traced back to Hinduism, but he has adapted by the Japanese culture. He comes from the Hindu god Kubera and is known by the name Vaisravana from Hindu culture. He is the god of fortune in war and battles, also associated with authority and dignity and he is literally the protector of those who follow the rules and behave appropriately
