Kasuga-taisha

Kasuga-taisha stands at the eastern edge of Nara, where the city's great park gives way to the dark forest of Mount Kasuga, and it is reached in the most atmospheric way possible: along avenues lined with moss-covered stone lanterns, beneath tall cedars, among the free-roaming deer for which Nara is known. More than 3,000 lanterns — stone ones along the paths, bronze ones hanging in rows from the eaves of the corridors — are the shrine's signature, and they give the whole precinct its quiet, slightly otherworldly character.

The shrine was founded in 768 by the Fujiwara, the most powerful aristocratic clan of the Nara and Heian periods, to house their tutelary kami. According to the shrine's legend, the first of these gods, Takemikazuchi, arrived on Mount Mikasa riding a white deer, which is why the deer of Nara are still treated as sacred messengers. Four principal deities are enshrined in the main sanctuary. Its form — a gabled roof with the entrance on the gable end and a sweeping canopy over the steps — is so distinctive that it gave its name to a whole style of shrine architecture, kasuga-zukuri.

Kasuga has traditionally been renewed at regular intervals, about every 20 years; the most recent rebuilding, the 60th, was completed in 2016. Behind the shrine the Kasugayama Primeval Forest has been protected from hunting and logging since the 9th century, so the shrine still sits inside the kind of woodland that surrounded it at its founding. Shrine, forest and the other great monuments of the old capital are inscribed together as the Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara World Heritage Site.

Twice a year, at the Mantōrō festivals in early February and mid-August, all the lanterns are lit at once, and the corridors and paths glow in the dark. From late April into early May, wisteria blooms in the shrine's botanical garden, which gathers plants named in the Manyoshu, Japan's oldest poetry anthology.

Getting there

Kasuga-taisha is about 4 km from central Nara. From Kintetsu Nara or JR Nara Station, buses reach the Kasuga Taisha Honden stop in about 15 minutes; the walk through Nara Park takes about half an hour. The nearest airport is Osaka Itami (ITM), about 39 km away; Kansai International is the usual gateway for international flights.