Toyotama-Hime

Toyotama-Hime-no-Mikoto is recorded in Kojiki (712 CE) and Nihon Shoki (720 CE) as a sea-deity goddess, the daughter of the sea deity Watatsumi-no-Kami and the consort of Hoori-no-Mikoto (Yamasachihiko), to whom she bears Ugayafukiaezu-no-Mikoto. Her true form is the eight-fathom shark (yahirowani), as the Kojiki Upper Volume Yamasachihiko-Umisachihiko passage records: she meets Hoori in the sea-deity palace and is wed to him, and at the time of birth tells him, "When women of another country are about to give birth, they return to their original form," asking him not to look upon the birth-hut. When Hoori breaks this and sees the eight-fathom shark form, she is ashamed and returns to the sea, entrusting the child to her younger sister Tamayori-Hime-no-Mikoto. She is enshrined at Aoshima Jinja in Miyazaki, Kaijin Jinja and Watatsumi Jinja in Tsushima; Watatsumi Jinja preserves the tradition of the sea-deity palace, marked by torii standing in the sea before the shrine.