Note 38 — Chapter XVII · Culture Mixing in Japan

The tama is of great importance in Shinto religion. At Ise,38 “the Japanese Mecca”, which has long been visited by pious pilgrims, a virgin daughter of the Mikado used to keep watch over the three imperial insignia—the mirror, the sword, and the jewel (tama)—which had been handed down from Mikado to Mikado. There were no idols in the temples. The Shintai was carefully wrapped up and kept in a box in the “holy of holies”, a screened-off part of the simple and unadorned wooden and thatched little temple. The temple was entered through a gateway—the tori wi, a word which means “bird-perch”, in the sense of a hen-roost. “As an honorary gateway”, says Dr. Aston, “the tori-wi is a continental institution identical in purpose and resembling in form the toran of India, the pailoo of China, and the hong-sal-mun of Korea.”39 When this symbol of Artemis40 was introduced into Japan is uncertain. “Rock gates” were of great sanctity in old Japan. There is one at Ise—the “twin-rocks of Ise”.