Sakitori Shrine

Sakitori Shrine, located in Shinomiya, Hiratsuka City, Kanagawa Prefecture, is identified with Sakitori Shrine of Osumi District in Sagami Province listed in the Engishiki Jinmyocho, and is the fourth shrine of Sagami Province (shi-no-miya). It stands on the right bank of the Sagami River near the assumed site of the Sagami provincial government. Together with Samukawa Shrine (ichinomiya), Kawawa Shrine (ninomiya), and Hibita Shrine (sannomiya), it forms the four shrines that take part in the Kono Machi festival of Sagami. The principal deities are Uji-no-Wakiiratsuko-no-Mikoto, Oyamakui-no-Mikoto, and Yamato Takeru-no-Mikoto. Uji-no-Wakiiratsuko-no-Mikoto, recorded in the middle book of the Kojiki as the son of Ojin Tenno who yielded the throne to his elder half-brother Nintoku Tenno, is rare as a kami of learning. The shrine shares lineage with Uji Shrine in Kyoto. Together with Tsurugaoka Hachimangu's veneration of Ojin Tenno, it forms one cluster of Sagami devotion. The founding date is uncertain; tradition refers to the reign of Ojin Tenno (4th-5th century). The Kono Machi festival on May 5 is an intangible folk cultural property of Kanagawa Prefecture.