🪵THE THATCHED VILLAGE🛖
vegetables hung to dry
at two houses...
thatch dripping rain
二軒前干菜かけたり草の雨
-Kobayashi Issa (小林一茶), 1803.
Trans. David Lanoue.
About an hour's drive north west of Kyōto, Miyama's (美山) 'Kayabuki-no-sato' (かやぶきの里) is a small village of traditional farmhouses.
Shindō Hiroyuki (新道弘之), the owner of Little Indigo Museum (ちいさな藍美術館), is a world renowned indigo dyeing artist.
In the workshop you will see large, sunken vats where the deep blue dye is extracted from the Japanese indigo plant via fermentation.
#ちいさな藍美術館
🦌DEFEAT OF THE 8-HEADED DEER👹
Chii Hachimangū (知井八幡神社) stands on a hill to the north east of Kayabuki-no-sato, moved here in the late 18thC after a flood washed the original shrine away in 1567.
Its elaborate carvings tell the story of how the shrine came to be.
#妖怪 #yokai
In 713 violent deaths were reported about the village of Sasari (south east Miyama). The court, via divination, determined that the cause was a monstrous, 8-headed deer that lived in the mountains.
Empress Genmei sent Kōga Saburō Kaneie (甲賀三郎兼家) to kill the beast.
#Japan #知井八幡神社
All at once the huge, 8-headed deer (八頭大鹿) attacked, 16 antlers slashing the air.
Kaneie did not hesitate. He shot an arrow, striking the body of the beast.
The deer fled, but was mortally wounded. At the mountain base it collapsed on a rock, and Kaneie finished it off.
To thank Hachiman (and lay the spirit of the deer to rest), the court ordered a small shrine built close to the battle.
In reality the earliest record we have for Chii Hachimangū (知井八幡神社) dates to 1071. It was the head of 9 Hachiman shrines in the Chii district.
#Kyoto
Camellia Tea Ceremony
