Sakurajima Konohana-Sakuya-hime Legend

The Sakurajima Konohana-Sakuya-hime legend ties the active volcano Sakurajima in Kagoshima Bay to Konohana-Sakuya-hime-no-Mikoto, who in the upper scroll of the Kojiki (712 CE) and the age-of-the-gods section of the Nihon Shoki (720 CE) is the consort of Ninigi-no-Mikoto and bears three sons in a fire-bound delivery. In later mountain cults the goddess is identified as the deity of active volcanoes; in Satsuma and Osumi she becomes the principal deity of Sakurajima, worshipped alongside Tsukiyomi Shrine on its northeastern slope and Kirishima Jingu across the bay. The cult forms the southern wing of a belief area in which a female deity is enshrined on fire mountains, paralleling the Asama cult of Mount Fuji and the Hakusan cult of Kukurihime. Mount Mitake (Sakurajima, 1,117 m) is the central site. Later references include shrine origin texts, the Satsuma-domain gazetteer Sangoku Meishou Zue (1843), and the records of the Sakurajima volcano observatory.