is a small island in the northern part of

Lake Biwa is the largest freshwater lake in Japan. It is located entirely within Shiga Prefecture (west-central Honshu), northeast of the former capital city of Kyoto. Lake Biwa is an ancient lake, over 4 million years old. It is estimated to be the 13 ...

Shiga Prefecture is a landlocked prefecture of Japan in the Kansai region of Honshu. Shiga Prefecture has a population of 1,398,972 as of 1 February 2025 and has a geographic area of . Shiga Prefecture borders Fukui Prefecture to the north, Gifu Prefecture to th ...

, in the

Kansai region The or the lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshū. The region includes the prefectures of Nara, Wakayama, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo and Shiga, often also Mie, sometimes Fukui, Tokushima and Tottori. The metropol ...

of Japan. It has been known since ancient times for the beauty of its scenery and for its small

Shinto shrine A Stuart D. B. Picken, 1994. p. xxiii is a structure whose main purpose is to house ("enshrine") one or more kami, , the deities of the Shinto religion. The Also called the . is where a shrine's patron is or are enshrined.Iwanami Japanese dic ...

and Buddhist temples. Administratively, the island is part of the city of

Nagahama, Shiga is a Cities of Japan, city located in Shiga Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 116,043 in 46858 households and a population density of 120 persons per km2. The total area of the city is . Geography Nagahama is located ...

. The island is both a nationally designated Place of Scenic Beauty and

Historic Site A historic site or heritage site is an official location where pieces of political, military, cultural, or social history have been preserved due to their cultural heritage value. Historic sites are usually protected by law, and many have been re ...

Geology

Located about 2 kilometers south of Cape Tsuzurao, Chikubushima is the second largest island in Lake Biwa after . It has a circumference of about two kilometers and a maximum elevation of 197 meters. The entire island is a

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

monolith with steep rock walls, with only one port located on the southern end. The bottom of the lake around the island is deep, and the western part is the deepest part of Lake Biwa (104.1meters). The temples, shrines and several souvenir shops are located near the harbor. Religious and store employees come from outside the island; the island is uninhabited at night. The entire island was covered with evergreens until fairly recently. According to the vegetation survey data in Shiga Prefecture from 1972 to 1973, the island had dense groves of

Castanopsis ''Castanopsis'', commonly called chinquapin or chinkapin, is a genus of evergreen trees belonging to the beech family, Fagaceae. The genus contains about 140 species, which are today restricted to tropical and subtropical eastern Asia. The Engli ...

, '' Castanopsis cuspidata'', '' Cinnamomum pedunculatum'', ''

Ilex integra ''Ilex integra'', the elegance female holly, also called mochi tree, is an ornamental tree of the holly genus, which is native to parts of Asia, including Korea; Taiwan; the mid-southern regions of China; and Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu in Japan. ...

'', as well as '' Neolitsea sericea'', and ''

Camellia japonica ''Camellia japonica'', known as common camellia, or Japanese camellia, is a species of Camellia, a flowering plant genus in the family Theaceae. There are thousands of cultivars of ''C. japonica'' in cultivation, with many colors and forms of flo ...

'', and ''

Aralia elata ''Aralia elata'', also known as the Japanese angelica tree, Chinese angelica-tree, or Korean angelica-tree, is a species of woody plant in the family (biology), family Araliaceae native plant, native to eastern Asia (in Russia, China, Taiwan, the ...

'' among other species. However, from 1977 onward, a population of great cormorants began to colonise the area, displacing the previous existing

heron Herons are long-legged, long-necked, freshwater and coastal birds in the family Ardeidae, with 75 recognised species, some of which are referred to as egrets or bitterns rather than herons. Members of the genus ''Botaurus'' are referred to as bi ...

population of the northern portion of the island and increased rapidly in numbers. By 2007 more than 40,000 birds were nesting on the island, creating tremendous environmental damage. Despite efforts to control the population by both non-lethal and lethal means, the population continued to increase to over 60,000 by 2008.

Historical and cultural significance

Chikubushima was held to be a holy island since ancient times. During the

Nara period The of the history of Japan covers the years from 710 to 794. Empress Genmei established the capital of Heijō-kyō (present-day Nara). Except for a five-year period (740–745), when the capital was briefly moved again, it remained the capita ...

Gyōki was a Japanese Buddhist priest of the Nara period, born in Ōtori county, Kawachi Province (now Sakai, Osaka), the son of Koshi no Saichi. According to one theory, one of his ancestors was of Korean descent. Gyōki became a monk at Asuka-d ...

is said to have built a chapel on the island to house statues of the

Four Heavenly Kings The Four Heavenly Kings are four Buddhism, Buddhist gods or Deva (Buddhism), ''devas'', each of whom is believed to watch over one cardinal direction of the world. The Hall of Four Heavenly Kings is a standard component of Chinese Buddhism, Ch ...

, but its location and the veracity of this story is uncertain. In the south of the island, the

of Tsukubusuma claims to have been founded in 420 AD, and its associated Buddhist temple of Hōgon-ji in 724 AD. During the period of ''

Shinbutsu-shūgō ''Shinbutsu-shūgō'' (, "syncretism of kami and buddhas"), also called ''Shinbutsu-konkō'' (, "jumbling up" or "contamination of kami and buddhas"), is the syncretism of Shinto and Buddhism in Japan, Buddhism that was Japan's main organized rel ...

'', this was a single entity formerly known as the "Chikubu Benzai-ten", which was ranked with the Enoshima Shrine in the

Kantō region The is a geography, geographical region of Honshu, the largest island of Japan. In a common definition, the region includes the Greater Tokyo Area and encompasses seven prefectures of Japan, prefectures: Chiba Prefecture, Chiba, Gunma Prefe ...

and the

Itsukushima Shrine is a Shinto shrine on the island of Itsukushima (popularly known as Miyajima), best known for its "floating" ''torii''.Louis-Frédéric, Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric (2005)"''Itsukushima-jinja''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia'', p. 407. It is in the cit ...

in the

Chūgoku Region The , also known as the region, is the westernmost region of Honshū, the largest island of Japan. It consists of the prefectures of Hiroshima, Okayama, Shimane, Tottori and Yamaguchi. As of the 2020 census, it has a population of 7,328,339 ...

as one of Japan's Three Great Shrines of Benzaiten and was a popular spot for pilgrimage as No.30 on the Saigoku Kannon Pilgrimage route. During the

Sengoku period The was the period in History of Japan, Japanese history in which civil wars and social upheavals took place almost continuously in the 15th and 16th centuries. The Kyōtoku incident (1454), Ōnin War (1467), or (1493) are generally chosen as th ...

, retainers of

Azai Nagamasa was a Japanese ''daimyō'' of the Sengoku period known as the brother-in-law and enemy of Oda Nobunaga. Nagamasa was head of the Azai clan seated at Odani Castle in northern Ōmi Province and married Nobunaga's sister Oichi in 1564, fathering ...

confined his father Hisamasa to Chikubushima, forcing him into retirement and establishing Nagamasa as his successor. Many structures were brought to the island by

Toyotomi Hideyori was the son and designated successor of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the general who united all of Japan toward the end of the Sengoku period. His mother, Yodo-dono, was the niece of Oda Nobunaga. Early life Born in 1593, he was Hideyoshi's sec ...

, son of general

Toyotomi Hideyoshi , otherwise known as and , was a Japanese samurai and ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) of the late Sengoku period, Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods and regarded as the second "Great Unifier" of Japan.Richard Holmes, The World Atlas of Warfare: ...

. The temple's Kannon-dõ and the Karamon-style gate were brought here from the gravesite (Toyokuni-byo; now Toyokuni Shrine) of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. They originally stood in the Higashiyama

ward Ward may refer to: Division or unit * Hospital ward, a hospital division, floor, or room set aside for a particular class or group of patients, for example the psychiatric ward * Prison ward, a division of a penal institution such as a pris ...

Kyoto Kyoto ( or ; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan's largest and most populous island of Honshu. , the city had a population of 1.46 million, making it t ...

, and are regarded as fine examples of architecture from the Azuchi-Momoyama period. Moreover, the Karamon gate of the temple and the ''

honden In Shinto shrine architecture, the , also called , or sometimes as in Ise Shrine's case, is the most sacred building at a Shinto shrine, intended purely for the use of the enshrined ''kami'', usually symbolized by a mirror or sometimes by a sta ...

'' of the shrine are both National Treasures of Japan. During the

Edo Period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

, the island designated as one of the Eight Views of Lake Biwa. The shrine and the temple were formally separated by the decrees separating Buddhism from Shinto issued by the

Meiji government The was the government that was formed by politicians of the Satsuma Domain and Chōshū Domain in the 1860s. The Meiji government was the early government of the Empire of Japan. Politicians of the Meiji government were known as the Meiji ...

, but the distinction still remains blurred at Chikubushima. Several works of the Japanese performing arts relate to Chikubu. They include the Noh play '' Chikubushima'' and the Heike Biwa work ''Chikubushima Mōde'', two koto melodies named ''Chikubushima'', a '' jōruri'' (''itchūbushi''), a ''nagauta'', and a ''tokiwazu-bushi'' of the same name.

References

External links

琵琶湖開発総合管理所｜びわ湖の観光名所｜竹生島
Japan Water Agency, retrieved on November 21, 2008

Lake Biwa and Rivers Information Box, retrieved on November 21, 2008
神の住む島竹生島
Nagahama Sight-seeing Association, retrieved on August 23, 2010 {{Authority control Places of Scenic Beauty Historic Sites of Japan Islands of Shiga Prefecture Lake islands of Japan Nagahama, Shiga

Geology

Historical and cultural significance

See also

References

Further reading

External links