Ryozen Shrine

Ryozen Shrine stands at the western foot of Mount Ryozen in Ryozen-machi, Date, Fukushima. It enshrines the four Kitabatake father and sons, Chikafusa, Akiie, Akinobu and Morichika, who fought for the Southern Court in the Nanboku-cho period. Its former rank was Beppyo Kanpei-sha, and today it is a Beppyo shrine of the Association of Shinto Shrines. It is also counted among the Fifteen Shrines of the Kenmu Restoration.

Mount Ryozen, where the shrine stands, was the base of the Kitabatake family after Chikafusa, and also the place where Akiie set up the Mutsu provincial government. It is a mountain deeply tied to the Kenmu Restoration, and the shrine was built on this historic ground.

The path to its founding goes back to the Edo period. In 1817, Matsudaira Sadanobu erected a Ryozen monument on the site. In 1868, the Yonezawa domain Confucian scholar Nakayama Sekido and the physician Nishio Motonori began a movement to establish a shrine to Akiie and the others. When Emperor Meiji toured the Tohoku region in 1876, Ryozen, with its links to the Kenmu Restoration, was chosen, and in 1880 the shrine buildings were constructed at the foot of the mountain on the site of a branch castle of the Kitabatake clan. The enshrinement ceremony was held on May 11, 1881, and in 1885 the shrine was ranked as a Beppyo Kanpei-sha.

In the Meiji era, Saigo Tanomo, a former chief retainer of the Aizu domain, served as the shrine's second chief priest from 1889 to 1899. His adopted son Saigo Shiro later studied under Kano Jigoro at the Kodokan and became a judoka, said to be the model for Sanshiro Sugata, the hero of the well-known novel and films.

The highlight of the precincts is the stone stairway of the main approach. The formal route is to climb the 256 stone steps that start in the Oishi-Kosaka district, but the west approach is a paved road that large buses can use as far as the midpoint. There are three parking lots, and on festival days or when there is snow, the road beyond the middle lot may be closed. The grounds also contain a "Kantsu-seki" stone, dedicated from the tunnel excavation of the Soma-Fukushima Road built after the Great East Japan Earthquake. Treasures handed down include the brocade banner that the western army raised in the Boshin War, copies of the Jinno Shotoki and the Shokugensho, and autograph letters by Kitabatake Akiie and Nitta Yoshisada.

Annual festivals are held on April 29 and October 10. At the spring festival, the "Ranshobugaku," a sword dance that originates in a sword dance linked to Akiie, is dedicated, in which boys brandish swords to the beat of drums. Around the autumn festival, the maple trees in the grounds, said to have been transplanted from Arashiyama in Kyoto, are at their best.

By car, it takes about 42 minutes from JR Fukushima Station and about 15 minutes from Ryozen IC on the Tohoku-Chuo Expressway. Nearby are Ryozen Prefectural Natural Park, the Ryozen Kosai-kan and the Roadside Station Date no Sato Ryozen, so you can combine a visit with a walk in the historic mountain.