Yatsushiro Shrine (Myoken-gu)

Known locally as “Myoken-san,” this is the largest shrine in Yatsushiro City. The origins of the Upper Shrine date back to 795, followed by the founding of the Middle Shrine in 1160 and the Lower Shrine in 1186.

Fitting for an ancient shrine in the Yatsushiro area, long known as a thriving port town for trade, it enshrines a principal deity that deifies the North Star and the Big Dipper, both essential for night voyages. There is also a unique legend saying that this deity crossed the sea from China riding on the back of an imaginary creature called a “kida.”

The Yatsushiro Myoken Festival, the grand annual autumn festival held every November, is one of Kyushu’s three major festivals and is registered as a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage. With around 40 performances and floats, including sacred horses, a large-scale shinko procession involving about 1,700 participants, and elegant lion dances and other refined traditional rituals, the shrine attracts as many as 150,000 worshippers from across Japan.