is a traditional Ryukyuan

cultural artifact A cultural artifact, or cultural artefact (see American and British English spelling differences), is a term used in the social sciences, particularly anthropology, ethnology and sociology for anything created by humans which gives information ...

and decoration derived from

Chinese guardian lions Chinese guardian lions, or imperial guardian lions, are a traditional Chinese architectural ornament. Typically made of stone, they are also known as stone lions or shishi (). They are known in colloquial English as lion dogs, foo dogs, or fu ...

, often seen in similar pairs, resembling a cross between a

lion The lion (''Panthera leo'') is a large Felidae, cat of the genus ''Panthera'', native to Sub-Saharan Africa and India. It has a muscular, broad-chested body (biology), body; a short, rounded head; round ears; and a dark, hairy tuft at the ...

and a

dog The dog (''Canis familiaris'' or ''Canis lupus familiaris'') is a domesticated descendant of the gray wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it was selectively bred from a population of wolves during the Late Pleistocene by hunter-gatherers. ...

, from Okinawan mythology. Shisa are wards, believed to protect from some evils. People place pairs of shisa on their rooftops or flanking the gates to their houses, with the left shisa traditionally having a closed mouth, the right one an open mouth. The open mouth shisa traditionally wards off evil spirits, and the closed mouth shisa keeps good spirits in.

History

Like the ''

komainu , often called lion-dogs in English, are statue pairs of lion-like creatures, which traditionally guard the entrance or gate of the shrine, or placed in front of or within the ''honden'' (inner sanctum) of Japanese Shinto shrines. Symbolic mea ...

'' ("lion dogs"), the shisa are a variation of the guardian lions from

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

. From 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 ...

, they started to be called "guardian dogs" in general in mainland Japan. Gender is variously assigned to the shisa. Some Okinawans believe the male has his mouth closed to keep bad out of the home, while the female has her mouth open to share goodness. Others believe the female has her mouth closed to "keep in the good", while the male has his mouth open to "scare away the bad" (Compare this to the distinction between male and female guardian lions in Chinese culture).

Legend

When a Chinese emissary returned from a voyage to the court at

Shuri Castle is a Ryukyu Islands, Ryukyuan ''gusuku'' castle in Shuri, Okinawa, Shuri, Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. Between 1429 and 1879, it was the palace of the Ryukyu Kingdom, before becoming largely neglected. In 1945, during the Battle of Okinawa, it was ...

, he brought a gift for the king, a necklace decorated with a figurine of a shisa. The king found it charming and wore it underneath his clothes. At the

Naha is the Cities of Japan, capital city of Okinawa Prefecture, the southernmost prefecture of Japan. As of 1 June 2019, the city has an estimated population of 317,405 and a population density of 7,939 people per km2 (20,562 persons per sq. mi.). ...

Port bay, the village of Madanbashi was often terrorized by a sea dragon who ate the villagers and destroyed their property. One day, the king was visiting the village, and one of these attacks happened; all the people ran and hid. The local '' noro'' had been told in a dream to instruct the king when he visited to stand on the beach and lift up his figurine towards the dragon; she sent the boy, Chiga, to tell him the message. He faced the monster with the figurine held high, and immediately a giant roar sounded all through the village, a roar so deep and powerful that it even shook the dragon. A massive boulder then fell from heaven and crushed the dragon's tail, so that he couldn't move, and eventually died. This boulder and the dragon's body became covered with plants and surrounded by trees, and can still be seen today as the "Gana-mui Woods" near Naha Ohashi bridge. The townspeople then built a large stone ''shisa'' to protect it from the dragon's spirit and other threats.

Great Stone Shisa at Tomimori

At Tomimori Village near Kochinda Town in the far southern part of Okinawa, there were often many fires. The people of the area sought out Saiouzui, a

Feng Shui Feng shui ( or ), sometimes called Chinese geomancy, is a traditional form of geomancy that originated in ancient China and claims to use energy forces to harmonize individuals with their surrounding environment. The term ''feng shui'' mean ...

master, to ask him why there were so many fires. He believed they were because of the power of the nearby Mt. Yaese, and suggested that the townspeople build a stone shisa to face the mountain. They did so, and thus have protected their village from fire ever since.

Bibliography

*Chizue, Sesoko. ''Legends of Okinawa''. First publication, in Okinawa, 1969.

Gallery

File:Shisa face.svg, Stylised image of a shisa File:名護市のシーサー.JPG, ''Shisa'' in

Nago is a city located in the northern part of Okinawa Island, Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. As of December 2012, the city has an estimated population of 61,659 and a population density of 293 persons per km2. Its total area is 210.30 km2. Geo ...

, Okinawa Prefecture File:Guardians.jpg, Varieties of shisa (excluding the dragon) at a shop File:Shisa Okinawa.jpg, Shisa at a shop File:Okinawan shisa.JPG, Typical (right-side) shisa File:Okinawan shīsā.jpg, A closed-mouth (left-side) shisa File:Shisa.jpg, Open-mouthed shisa on a traditional tile roof in

Okinawa Prefecture is the southernmost and westernmost prefecture of Japan. It consists of three main island groups—the Okinawa Islands, the Sakishima Islands, and the Daitō Islands—spread across a maritime zone approximately 1,000 kilometers east to west an ...

File:Miyakojima-Shisa.jpg, Shisa statue on Miyako Island File:Shisa on vending machines.jpg, Shisa on

vending machine A vending machine is an automated machine that dispenses items such as snacks, beverages, cigarettes, and lottery tickets to consumers after cash, a credit card, or other forms of payment are inserted into the machine or payment is otherwise m ...

s File:OIST logo.png, The Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology uses a stylised Shisa as its logo.

References

External links

{{commons category, Shisa
Image of a shisaaNetsuke: masterpieces from the Metropolitan Museum of Art
an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains many representations of Shisa Okinawan legendary creatures Japanese folk art Japanese folklore Mythological lions Mythological dogs Lions in art Chinese lions