Shut herself in a rock cave after her brother's outrages, and the world went dark
Ama-no-Iwato; the eight hundred gods gathered outside to plot her return.
Myth · Around the world
Amaterasu
Japanese mythology — Shinto sun goddess and ancestor of the emperors
The sun goddess of Shinto and the most important deity in the Japanese pantheon. Born from the left eye of Izanagi, she quarrels with her storm-god brother, hides in a cave and takes the light of the world with her, and is coaxed out by a bawdy dance and the sight of her own reflection. Japan's imperial line claims unbroken descent from her, and her mirror is enshrined at Ise.
How to spot them
- ▸Sun goddess whose great shrine is rebuilt from scratch every twenty years
- ▸Born from a god's left eye as he purified himself after visiting the land of the dead
- ▸Her sacred mirror is one of the three imperial regalia of Japan
- ▸Quiz clue: 'Ise', 'the rock cave of heaven', 'Susanoo', 'the chrysanthemum throne'
Stories & episodes
Lured out of hiding by a ribald dance, roaring laughter, and her own face in a mirror on a tree
Ame-no-Uzume's dance; a rope was strung behind her so she could not go back in.
A chewing-and-spitting oath contest with her brother produced five gods and three goddesses
The ukehi, fought over his intentions in coming to heaven.
Her brother, exiled, killed an eight-headed serpent and sent her the sword found in its tail
Kusanagi, taken from the tail of the Yamata no Orochi.
Sent her grandson down to rule the islands, with a mirror, a sword and a jewel
Ninigi's descent; his great-grandson Jimmu is counted the first emperor.
Her mirror is housed in a shrine torn down and rebuilt on an adjacent site every twenty years
The Naiku at Ise; the Shikinen Sengu was last performed in 2013.
Japan's emperor publicly renounced descent from her on New Year's Day 1946
Hirohito's 'Humanity Declaration' after the Second World War.
Quick-fire facts
- •Her full name is Amaterasu-Omikami, 'the great god who shines in heaven'
- •Her story is told in the Kojiki (712) and the Nihon Shoki (720)
- •She is born from Izanagi's left eye; Tsukuyomi the moon god from his right, and Susanoo from his nose
- •The mirror Yata no Kagami, the sword Kusanagi and the jewel Yasakani no Magatama are the Three Sacred Treasures
- •Her shrine is the Naiku at Ise, rebuilt every twenty years in the Shikinen Sengu ceremony
- •The sword Kusanagi is kept at Atsuta Shrine in Nagoya, the mirror at Ise, the jewel at the imperial palace
- •Her emblem, the rising sun, underlies the Japanese flag and the name Nippon, 'origin of the sun'
- •Ame-no-Uzume, the goddess whose dance drew her out, is regarded as the origin of kagura dance
- •State Shinto made descent from her the basis of imperial legitimacy until 1945
Drill it — 9 cards
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Sources
- trans. Donald L. Philippi — Kojiki
- John Breen and Mark Teeuwen — A New History of Shinto