Deities

Sarutahiko

Japanese Deities

Citation Formats

General Reference

Divinity Atlas. "Sarutahiko." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://www.divinityatlas.com/deities/sarutahiko.

APA Style

Divinity Atlas. (n.d.). Sarutahiko. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://www.divinityatlas.com/deities/sarutahiko

BibTeX

@misc{divinityatlas-sarutahiko,
  author = {Divinity Atlas},
  title = {Sarutahiko},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://www.divinityatlas.com/deities/sarutahiko},
  note = {Accessed August 30, 2026}
}

Sarutahiko is the great kami of the earthly crossroads, an imposing figure who stands at the meeting of heaven and earth to guide the heavenly deities down to the land. In the myth of the descent of the imperial ancestor, Sarutahiko appears at the eight crossroads of heaven, a towering deity with a long nose and a radiant, ruddy face, and he leads the heavenly grandson and his party down to the world below, for which he is honoured as a deity of guidance, of roads and journeys, and of the pivotal point where a way divides. He is closely linked to the goddess Ame-no-Uzume, who was sent to confront and question him and who afterwards became his consort, and his commanding features made him a model for the long-nosed tengu and for the red guardian masks of festival. As the kami who shows the way, he is invoked for safe travel, for good beginnings and for guidance through decisive turnings.

Facts

Function

Domain / Function

Travel, roads and boundaries 1

Domain / Function

Protection and guardianship 1

Origins

Origin of the Name

Sarutahiko's name joins Saruta, an etymologically obscure element traditionally written with characters meaning monkey field, to hiko, a title for a male of noble or divine rank, giving roughly Prince of Saruta or, read through the monkey gloss, Monkey Prince. The Kojiki supports the monkey reading indirectly, describing his hand caught in a shellfish while fishing, the same folktale motif told elsewhere of monkeys. 2

Identity

Gender

Male 1

History

Historical Note

His commanding features made him a model for the long-nosed tengu of Japanese folklore and for the red guardian masks of festival; he is invoked for safe travel, good beginnings and guidance through decisive turnings. 1

Cult

Attributes and Iconography

Traditionally described in the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki as having an extraordinarily long nose and towering height, features later linked to the tengu figures of Japanese folklore. 1

Attributions

Mythic Association

Met the heavenly grandson Ninigi at the crossroads of heaven and earth to guide his descent, and afterward married Ame-no-Uzume, who had been sent to question him. 1

Belief

Theology

Animist: persons and powers in land, water and living things 1

Attestation

Veneration Today

Actively venerated in a living tradition 1

Historicity

Not a historical person: a divine or other-than-human being 1

Learn More

The Kami Who Guided the Descent from Heaven

Sarutahiko (Sarutahiko Okami) is an earthly kami (kunitsukami) of Japanese myth, remembered above all as the deity who guided the descent of the heavenly grandchild. When Ninigi, grandson of the sun-goddess Amaterasu, came down from Heaven to rule the land, the mythic charter of the imperial line, it was Sarutahiko, a towering, long-nosed, ruddy figure of imposing appearance, who stood at the crossroads of Heaven and earth and led the way.

For this he is honoured as a god of guidance, of roads and crossings and of new beginnings, and is invoked for safe travel and for the auspicious opening of undertakings. In the myth he afterwards marries the kami Ame-no-Uzume, the goddess whose dance had earlier helped draw Amaterasu from her cave. His striking appearance links him in the popular imagination to the long-nosed tengu and to the masked figures who lead festival processions, and he is enshrined at Tsubaki Grand Shrine and elsewhere as a guardian of the way.

A Guiding God Drowned by a Shellfish

Sarutahiko's own death, recorded immediately after his celebrated guidance of the heavenly descent, is a stranger and more abrupt episode than the guidance myth usually receives credit for. According to the Kojiki, after leading Ninigi safely to earth and escorting his new wife Ame-no-Uzume back toward his own country, Sarutahiko went fishing at a place called Azaka in Ise, and while he was fishing a shellfish, called a hirame in the text, caught and clamped down on his hand; struggling in the sea, he was pulled under and drowned.

The text does not treat the death as a defeat or a punishment but records it almost as a natural incident, and it goes on to derive further divine names from the event, a spirit born of his sinking beneath the waves and another from the froth and bubbles that rose to the surface as he drowned. The episode ties Sarutahiko permanently to the Ise region and to the sea, in addition to his more famous role as guide of the crossroads on dry land, and it is one of the reasons his cult has old roots around Ise and along the coast there, quite apart from his shrine at Tsubaki further inland. The abruptness of the story, a guiding god of imposing size undone by an ordinary shellfish, has drawn comment from scholars as an example of the matter of fact tone Japanese myth can take even toward the deaths of major kami.

Correspondences & Relations

Pantheons

Japanese

Cross-Tradition Connections

Associated With

Ame-no-Uzume

This source names Sarutahiko directly: "stranger directly, learning that he is Sarutahiko, the earthly kami sent to guide the descent rather than to oppose it."

Source KojikiDonald L. Philippi (translator)

Sarutahiko, No. 2 (Art Institute of Chicago, 1970.520)

This source names Sarutahiko directly: "color woodblock surimono print titled "Sarutahiko, No."

Source Sarutahiko, No. 2, accession 1970.520 (Art Institute of Chicago)

Sarutahiko, No. 2, accession 1970.520 (Art Institute of Chicago)

This source names Sarutahiko directly: "open-access collection API record for "Sarutahiko, No."

Source Sarutahiko, No. 2, accession 1970.520 (Art Institute of Chicago)

Tsubaki Grand Shrine of America Relocates to Vancouver Island, Canada

This source names Sarutahiko directly: "War, relocated its enshrined kami, Sarutahiko no Okami, Ame no Uzume no Mikoto and three further deities, from its longtime home in Granite Falls, Washington, to Shin Mei Spiritual Centre on Knapp..."

Source Tsubaki Grand Shrine of America Announces Its Move to Shin Mei Spiritual Centre