Kotohiki Hachimangu

Kotohiki Hachimangu, located in Hachiman-cho, Kanonji City, Kagawa Prefecture, is the tutelary shrine of the former Karita District in Sanuki Province, standing on the summit of Mt. Kotohiki (70 m) above the Seto Inland Sea. Below stretches Ariake Beach with the Zenigata sand figure of the Kan'ei Tsuho coin, said to have been formed in one night by the people in 1653 to welcome the Marugame lord. Adjacent stands Kannonji, the sixty-ninth station of the Shikoku Eighty-Eight Temples pilgrimage; the shrine and the temple long shared a single religious landscape. The principal deities are Ojin Tenno, Empress Jingu, and Tamayori-hime-no-Mikoto, the Hachiman three. The shrine belongs to the Hachiman lineage radiating from Usa Jingu in Buzen Province. The attendant deity Kotohiki-no-Okami reflects syncretism with the local genius loci. According to tradition, in 703 the monk Nissho built a hermitage on Mt. Kotohiki and, hearing the music of an old man playing the koto, invited Hachiman. The shrine was patronized by the Ukita, Ikoma, and finally the Kyogoku lords of Marugame. The Chosa Matsuri in October features taikodai processions.