Figure

Amaterasu

Celestial Deities

When her brother Susanoo, given free rein in heaven, tore up her rice paddies, defiled her hall, and flung a flayed horse through the roof of her weaving house, killing a maiden, Amaterasu fled in terror into the cave of Ame no Iwato and sealed it with a boulder, plunging the world into endless night. Kojiki tells how the eight hundred myriad gods gathered outside, hung a mirror and curved jewels from a sacred tree, and set the goddess Ame no Uzume dancing on an overturned tub until the assembly roared with laughter. Amaterasu, curious what could amuse the gods while she alone gave no light, opened the door a crack; shown her own dazzling reflection in the mirror, she was drawn out, and the god Tajikarao sealed the cave behind her, returning the sun to the world.

Facts

Origins

Founded

The Kojiki holds her the ancestress of the Japanese imperial line, sending her grandson Ninigi down to earth to rule and entrusting him with the sacred mirror, jewel and sword that would become the regalia of the imperial house she founded. 1

Attributions

Mythic Association

Born from Izanagi's left eye during his purification after fleeing Yomi, eldest and most senior of the Three Noble Children alongside her brothers Tsukuyomi and Susanoo. 1

Traditionthe subject's own account

Shinto, in which she is enshrined as the central deity of the Inner Shrine at Ise Jingu, Japan's most sacred shrine complex, rebuilt anew every twenty years in the Shikinen Sengu rite that keeps its wooden structures perpetually renewed. 2

Position Profile

Key Text

Kojiki 1

Identity

Symbol

The Yata no Kagami, the sacred mirror said to have lured her from the cave in which she had hidden the sun, is counted among the Three Sacred Treasures of Japan and is enshrined at Ise Grand Shrine as her sacred symbol. 1

Gender

Female 1

Status

Status Within the Traditionthe subject's own account

Meiji era State Shinto made her worship the ideological basis of the modern Japanese monarchy, presenting the emperor as her direct living descendant, a doctrine Emperor Hirohito formally renounced in his January 1946 declaration disavowing divine descent. 2

Life

Office Heldthe subject's own account

Sun goddess and ruler of Takamagahara, the heavenly realm; chief deity among the kami and, through her grandson Ninigi, mythical ancestress of the Japanese imperial line 2

Attestation

Historicity

Legendary: known from narrative tradition, not the historical record 1

Veneration Todaythe subject's own account

Actively venerated in a living tradition 2

Traditions Revering This Figurethe subject's own account

Shinto 2

History

Historical Notethe subject's own account

After Susanoo defiled her palace and rice fields and flayed a sacred horse, Amaterasu withdrew into the cave Ama-no-Iwato, plunging heaven and earth into darkness. The other gods lured her back out with a mirror and Ame-no-Uzume's dance, restoring light to the world. 2

Practice

Lineage

Daughter of Izanagi, born from his left eye in his purification; sister of Tsukuyomi and Susanoo; ancestress of the imperial line of Japan 1

In Other Languages (14 names)

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The Sun Goddess Who Hid in a Cave

Amaterasu's central myth, told in Japan's earliest chronicles, the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki, follows the aftermath of her brother Susanoo's rampage through heaven, in which he broke down the ridges between her rice paddies, defiled her sacred hall, and flung a flayed horse through the roof of the weaving hall where her attendant sat, an act that killed the maiden inside. In grief and outrage Amaterasu withdrew into the cave of Ame no Iwato and sealed its entrance with a boulder, and her absence plunged the whole world into permanent darkness, since she is herself the sun. The other gods gathered outside the cave and devised a plan to draw her out: they gathered long crowing birds and made them call out together before the cave, mimicking the arrival of dawn, then hung a sacred mirror and jewels on a tree before the entrance, and the goddess Ame no Uzume performed a wild, exposing dance atop an overturned tub that sent the assembled gods into uproarious laughter. Amaterasu, curious what could provoke such joy in a world she believed dark and joyless without her, opened the boulder slightly to look, saw her own radiant reflection in the mirror and, drawn further out by that sight, was pulled fully into the open, restoring light to the world.

Ancestress of the Imperial Line

Amaterasu occupies a place in Shinto that goes well beyond the cave myth: tradition holds that the imperial line of Japan descends directly from her, through her grandson Ninigi, whom she sent down from heaven to rule the earthly land, making her the mythic root of the emperorship itself rather than simply one deity among many. The sacred mirror used to draw her from the cave, called Yata no Kagami, is counted among the three imperial regalia of Japan alongside a sword and a jewel, and tradition holds it enshrined today at Ise Grand Shrine, the most sacred site in Shinto and Amaterasu's principal center of worship, periodically rebuilt in a centuries old ritual practice of renewal called shikinen sengu. She is worshipped there and across a wide network of shrines under the associated qualities of the sun and of sovereignty, a pairing that reflects exactly this double identity, cosmic and dynastic at once. The cave myth itself is read across Shinto tradition as more than a folk tale: it is understood as an origin account for ritual practices that even today center on drawing divine presence out through music, mirrors and offerings, the same elements Ame no Uzume's dance first brought together outside the sealed cave.

Connections

Associated With

Amaterasu Emerging From Exile (World History Encyclopedia)

This source names Amaterasu directly: "Toyokuni III showing the sun goddess Amaterasu, the principal deity of Shinto, emerging from self-imposed exile in a cave, with a figure identified as the god Ame-no-Tajikarawo at right."

Source Amaterasu Emerging From Exile (World History Encyclopedia)

Ame-no-Uzume

This source names Ame-no-Uzume directly: "When her brother Susanoo, given free rein in heaven, tore up her rice paddies, defiled her hall, and flung a flayed horse through the roof of her weaving house, killing a maiden, Amaterasu fled in..."

Source KojikiDonald L. Philippi (translator)

Chosen Shrine (Wikipedia)

This source names Amaterasu directly: "ceremony, its dedication to Amaterasu and Emperor Meiji, the 1925 order making shrine attendance compulsory for schoolchildren and its 1935 extension to university students and government employees..."

Source Chosen Shrine (Wikipedia)

Emperor Akihito Performs the First Daijosai Since State Shinto's Disestablishment

This source names Amaterasu directly: "harvested rice to the sun goddess Amaterasu and the deities of heaven and earth."

Source Accession to the Throne and Major State Ceremonies and Events (Imperial Household Agency)

GHQ's Shinto Directive Disestablishes State Shinto

This source names Amaterasu directly: "the emperor's divine descent from Amaterasu and claims of Japanese racial superiority, ending seventy seven years of Shinto's standing as a tool of state ideology and forcing every shrine to..."

Source Shinto Directive (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Origin of Iwato Kagura Dance (Utagawa Kunisada, 1856)

This source names Amaterasu directly: "the Ama-no-Iwato myth: the sun goddess Amaterasu-Omikami, having withdrawn into a cave and plunged the world into darkness, emerges after the other gods set a mirror before the cave mouth and staged..."

Source Amaterasu Emerging From Exile (World History Encyclopedia)

Origin of Iwato Kagura Dance, File Record (Wikimedia Commons)

This source names Amaterasu directly: "documentation source, and describing Amaterasu-Omikami as the central figure of the three-panel composition, emerging from the cave after the other gods set a mirror before it and celebrated."

Source Origin of Iwato Kagura Dance, File Record (Wikimedia Commons)

State Shinto (Wikipedia)

This source names Amaterasu directly: "emphasizing the emperor's descent from Amaterasu, and the historian Sakamoto Koremaru's scholarly dating of the formal "State Shinto system" to 1900 through 1945."

Source State Shinto (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Susanoo

This source names Susanoo directly: "When her brother Susanoo, given free rein in heaven, tore up her rice paddies, defiled her hall, and flung a flayed horse through the roof of her weaving house, killing a maiden, Amaterasu fled in..."

Source KojikiDonald L. Philippi (translator)

The Chosen Jingu Imperial Shrine Opens in Seoul

This source names Amaterasu directly: "in Seoul enshrining the sun goddess Amaterasu and the deified Emperor Meiji, with an enshrinement ceremony held in October."

Source The Chosen Jingu Imperial Shrine and Schools in Colonial Korea (Studies in the History of Education)Satoko Hiura

The Meiji Government Establishes State Shinto

This source names Amaterasu directly: "divine descent from the sun goddess Amaterasu."

Source State Shinto (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Tsukuyomi, Shinbutsu-zue Plate

This source names Amaterasu directly: "Tsukuyomi plate sits among plates for Amaterasu, Susanoo and the deity's fellow primordial kami, reflecting Tsukuyomi's place as the second of the three noble children born to Izanagi."

Source Shinbutsu-zue, Bibliographic Record (National Diet Library of Japan)

Belongs to Tradition

Shinto

Source KojikiDonald L. Philippi (translator)

Depicted In

Okami

The player controls Amaterasu, restored to a wolf's body, as the game's protagonist throughout.

Source Okami (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Originated In

Japan

Source Amaterasu (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors

Revered In

Shinto

Same Figure Other Register

Amaterasu

Sources

1. Kojiki

Donald L. Philippi (translator), University of Tokyo Press, 1968

on the Heavenly Rock Cave
on Amaterasu's birth from Izanagi's left eye and her seniority among the Three Noble Children

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2. Amaterasu (Wikipedia)

Wikipedia contributors, Wikipedia, 2026

on the Ama-no-Iwato cave episode
When the time came for the Sun-Goddess to celebrate the feast of first-fruits, Sosa no wo no Mikoto secretly voided excrement under her august seat in the New Palace. The Sun-Goddess, not knowing this, went straight there and took her seat. Accordingly the Sun-Goddess drew herself up, and was sickened. She therefore was enraged, and straightway took up her abode in the Rock-cave of Heaven, and fastened its Rock-door.
Originated In: Japan, Lead section
Ōhirume no Muchi (大日孁貴), is the goddess of the sun in Japanese mythology.

View the Source

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