Yaegaki Shrine

Little knownBarely documented in English. This is the kind of place the site exists for.

Researched and written by Hinato

Yaegaki Shrinemirror pondSusanoofortune tellingMatsue

Photo: Hanabishi / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0) · original

Before Yaegaki Shrine became a stop on any list, it was — and still is — a working place of worship in Shimane.

Yaegaki enshrines Susanoo and Kushinada — the god who killed the eight-headed serpent Yamata-no-Orochi and the woman he saved and married — which makes it, in the local reckoning, the site of the first marriage in Japanese myth. That is why people come, and why the shrine's real attraction sits in a small wood behind the main hall rather than in front of it.

The Kagami-no-Ike, the mirror pond, is a spring-fed pool where Kushinada is said to have looked at her reflection. You buy a sheet of divining paper at the shrine office, place a ten- or hundred-yen coin on it, and float it. What matters is how long it takes to sink and where: within fifteen minutes means a match is close in time, over thirty means it will take a while, and sinking near the bank means someone nearby while drifting away means someone from far off. It is a genuinely absorbing thing to watch, and the small crowd standing silently around a pond staring at pieces of paper is a very Shimane scene.

Visiting essentials

Best time to visit

Year-round | Quietest outside October

Hours

Grounds open during daylight hours | Shrine office typically 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM

Closed: Open year-round

Admission

Free | Mirror pond divining paper: ¥100 | Treasure hall priced separately

Time to allow

45–60 minutes

Access route

Directions

Sakusa-cho, Matsue. By bus from JR Matsue Station to the Yaegaki Jinja stop, which is at the shrine. Grounds free to enter; divining paper for the mirror pond is ¥100 at the shrine office. Free parking.

Beyond the guidebook

**Bring the right coin.** The divination uses a ten-yen or hundred-yen coin placed on the paper. Anything heavier sinks the sheet immediately and anything lighter will not sink it at all. If you have no coins, the shrine office sells the paper but not the coin. **Buy the paper before you walk back.** The pond is in the wood behind the main hall, several minutes from the office. Working out that you need to buy something once you are standing at the water is the standard mistake. **Go early for the pond.** The wood is small and gets congested from mid-morning onward, particularly in October when the whole prefecture fills with people making the Izumo shrine circuit. Before 10:00 AM you may have it to yourself. **Look at the painted panels.** The shrine holds ninth-century painted wooden panels of the deities, among the oldest shrine paintings in Japan, displayed in the treasure hall. Most visitors walk past them on the way to the pond. **Chain it with Kamosu and Kumano.** All three are part of the Ou Rokusha group in the hills south of Matsue and are a short drive apart. Yaegaki is the busy one; the other two are near-empty.

View on Google Maps