Sanno Shrine (Nagasaki)

Sanno Shrine, located in Sakamoto, Nagasaki City, Nagasaki Prefecture, is the historical tutelary shrine of the Sakamoto district in northern Nagasaki and is widely known for its surviving one-legged torii damaged by the atomic bombing of August 9, 1945. It stands on the western bank of the Urakami River, within the surrounding cluster of atomic-bomb sites that includes the Urakami Cathedral, the Atomic Bomb Museum, and Peace Park, about 800 m southeast of the hypocenter. The principal deities are Amaterasu-omikami and Toyouke-no-Okami, with the syncretic Sanno Gongen, following the Hiyoshi-Sanno devotion that radiates from Hiyoshi Taisha in Otsu, Shiga. According to tradition, in the late medieval period a local Nagasaki warrior family invited the deity from Hiyoshi Taisha. In the early modern period it functioned as the local tutelary of the Urakami-Sakamoto district under the Nagasaki magistracy, and it received the village shrine rank in the Meiji era. The shrine buildings were destroyed by the atomic bombing of August 9, 1945, leaving only one side of the second torii standing. The one-legged torii and the surviving camphor trees of the precincts are preserved as memorials. The August 9 Peace Memorial rite continues alongside the October annual festival.