What is Kamigamo-jinja Shrine

Kamigamo-jinja Shrine locates in the North area of Kyoto city. The shrine is registered as UNESCO World Heritage.

As same as Shimogamo shrine, one of the primer shrines in Kyoto and it deify Gamo families’ deity. One of the tree major festivals of Kyoto “Aoi” festival is to be held by Kamogamo and Shimogamo shrines. The main god of the shrine is the god of the thunder. It shows us, ancient Japanese people were thinking thunder was also a God.

History

The shrine was established in 678 A.D. and it says as same as Shimogamo shrine, this is the most historical shrines of the history as the capital. During the 6th century, Japan was attacked by natural calamity. The nation was suffered so much. The emperor of at that time asked for the cause of the problem to fortunetellers. They told the curse of Gamo God and it was necessary to calm the God. Imperial court performed a secret ceremony and the curse was removed. After that the climate became great and unusual agricultural harvest was got. Kamigamo and Shimogamo shrines got many believers after this happened and especially the Imperial family was venerated strongly.
After Kamakura period, every famous Shoguns were visit the shrine. For example, “Yoshimitsu Ashikaga”, “Nobunaga Oda”, “Hideyoshi Toyotomi”, “Ieyasu Tokugawa”, Iemitsu Tokugawa”, etc were visit the shrine.

Feature

The first and the second entrance constructed gate, there are beautiful cherry tree especially “Gosho” cherry tree is large and elegant. Beside the entrance there are other cherry trees. The Gosho cherry tree was gift from an emperor of the time in 1873. After the entrances, there are more than 60 buildings of the shrine. In front of the main building there is another entrance calls cherry tree gate. The gate is colorful and totally different from the others looks. A bridge locates with sherry tree gate, is the national treasure. (Prohibited cross the bridge)