Ise Jingū

Timeline

1. 4 BC

   Traditional founding of Naiku

   According to Jingu tradition, Princess Yamatohime-no-mikoto enshrined Amaterasu on the banks of the Isuzu River, establishing the Inner Shrine.

2. 478 CE

   Founding of Geku

   In the 22nd year of Emperor Yuryaku's reign, Toyouke Omikami was brought from Tanba to Ise as the deity of food for Amaterasu.

3. 690 CE

   First Shikinen Sengu

   Empress Jito conducted the first ritual rebuilding of the shrines, inaugurating the twenty-year cycle that endures to this day.

4. 927 CE

   Engi-shiki codifies Jingu rites

   The Engi-shiki legal code formalized the rites, priesthood, and Shikinen Sengu institutions of Jingu within Japan's national ritual system.

5. 1462

   Sengu suspended

   On the eve of the Onin War, the 40th Sengu became the last for roughly 120 years as warfare and lost shrine income paralyzed Jingu.

6. 1585

   Sengu restored

   With Toyotomi Hideyoshi's patronage the 41st Sengu of Naiku was performed, reviving a tradition that had nearly perished.

7. 1830

   Bunsei Okage-mairi

   Roughly five million pilgrims — one in six Japanese — visited within six months in the largest Okage-mairi wave in history.

8. 1869

   Emperor Meiji's pilgrimage

   Emperor Meiji became the first reigning emperor in recorded history to make a personal visit to Jingu, formalizing its modern role.

9. 1946

   Religious corporation

   Following the GHQ Shinto Directive, Jingu left state administration and became a religious corporation as honso of Jinja Honcho.

10. 1993

    61st Shikinen Sengu

    The first postwar Sengu of full scale drew approximately 35 billion yen in donations from across Japan.

11. 2013

    62nd Shikinen Sengu

    The 62nd Sengu collected 55 billion yen in donations, reaffirming on the world stage Jingu's 1,300-year tradition of renewal.

12. 2033

    63rd Shikinen Sengu (scheduled)

    As of 2026, preparatory rites including the misoma-hajimesai ceremony for cutting sacred timber are already underway.

Detailed History

The traditional founding date of Naiku is set by the shrine itself at 4 BC, drawing on the Nihon Shoki account of Princess Yamatohime-no-mikoto enshrining Amaterasu in Ise during Emperor Suinin's reign. Modern historians and archaeologists, however, place its actual establishment somewhere between the 4th and 5th centuries CE, as the Yamato kingship extended its political reach eastward and ritualized the worship of Amaterasu as the imperial tutelary deity; the late-5th-century reign of Emperor Yuryaku is currently the leading scholarly hypothesis. Geku was established in 478 CE (the 22nd year of Yuryaku's reign), when Toyouke Omikami was brought from Tanba Province to serve as Amaterasu's food deity. The institution of the Shikinen Sengu — the ritual rebuilding of all shrine structures every twenty years — was inaugurated under Empress Jito in 692 CE, fulfilling the wishes of her late husband Emperor Tenmu. The cycle continued almost unbroken until the late Muromachi period: the 40th Sengu of 1462 was the last for around 120 years, as warfare engulfed Japan and shrine finances collapsed. Toyotomi Hideyoshi's support enabled the resumption with the 41st Sengu in 1585. Through the Heian period the shrine was placed at the head of the Twenty-Two Shrines as the chief of the upper seven, alone exempt from the shinkai (deity rank) system that governed other shrines. From the Kamakura period onward, onshi (lower-rank shrine officials) traveled the provinces distributing Jingu amulets, expanding the cult from court and warrior class to commoners. The Edo period brought the explosive popularity of okage-mairi: the 1830 wave brought roughly five million pilgrims in six months, equivalent to one in six of Japan's then 30 million population. In the Meiji era state Shinto placed Jingu above all categorization, and after the GHQ's 1946 Shinto Directive it became a religious corporation while retaining its position as the 'honso' (parent shrine) of the Association of Shinto Shrines overseeing roughly 80,000 shrines nationwide. The 62nd Shikinen Sengu of 2013 drew 55 billion yen in donations from across Japan, demonstrating the shrine's continuing pull on Japanese civic and spiritual life.

Cultural Significance

Ise Jingu is the only shrine in Japan that uses the term 'Jingu' as its proper name — a singular distinction among the country's 80,000 Shinto institutions. As the 'honso' (parent shrine) of the Association of Shinto Shrines, it stands at the apex of the entire Shinto hierarchy. The 125 affiliated shrines — comprising the two main shrines, betsugu, sessha, massha, and shokansha — are spread across four cities and two districts of Mie Prefecture, together forming the 'Jingu' as a religious whole. The yuiitsu-shinmei-zukuri architectural style, traced to Yayoi-period raised storehouses for sacred offerings, features gabled cypress roofs with chigi finials and katsuogi billets, joined entirely without nails. Practices unique to Jingu include 'imikotoba', a vocabulary of substitutions avoiding all Buddhist terms; the soni-yohai-jo where monks and nuns once worshipped from outside the precincts; and the early abolition of jinguji temples, which together preserved the rituals' archaic purity through Japan's syncretic medieval centuries. The philosophy of tokowaka — eternally young yet preserved by renewal every twenty years — symbolizes Japan's distinctive cultural logic of cyclical renewal, sustaining the miyadaiku carpenters' woodwork and the textile and metalwork crafts of the okazari sacred regalia for over thirteen centuries.

Architectural Details

The Honden are built in yuiitsu-shinmei-zukuri, an architectural form permitted only at Jingu. Each honden has a gabled (kirizuma), end-entry (hira-iri) thatched roof crowned with chigi — pairs of crossed beams projecting from each gable end — and katsuogi, short cylindrical billets laid along the ridge. At Naiku the chigi are cut horizontally (uchisogi, female deity) and the katsuogi number ten (even); at Geku the chigi are cut vertically (sotosogi) with nine katsuogi (odd), marking the male food deity. The structure rests on hottate-bashira (posts driven into earth without stone bases) and an independent shin-no-mihashira (central sacred pillar) under the floor. All material is cypress (hinoki) of 200-400 years old harvested from sacred Kiso forests, joined entirely by traditional Japanese carpentry without a single nail. Munemochi-bashira at both gable ends preserve the form of the Yayoi-period raised-floor storehouse. Four concentric fences enclose the sanctum, and pilgrims pray at the outer south gate. Every twenty years a new sanctuary is built on the adjacent miyajitsu site to identical dimensions, the kami moved, and the previous structure dismantled with timber distributed to shrines across Japan.