Maniana Inari Shrine (close up)

Mamiana Inari-sha is a small Shintō shrine housing a kami named 狸穴稲荷大明神 Mamiana Inari Daimyōjin. The shrine is relatively obscure in the grand scale of the history of Edo-Tōkyō. And as far as Inari Shrines go, this is just a tiny one in the Shiba-Mita-Azabu areas which is literally teeming with Inari Shrines.

 

The shrine is located in a shaded grove in 狸穴公園 Mamiana Kōen (Mamiana Park). The area is traditionally called 麻布狸穴町 Azabu-Mamiana-chō found at the bottom of Mamiana Hill between Iikura and Azabu-Jūban. The shrine is well known to residents of the immediate area, but it’s so minor and so off the beaten path, that the average Tōkyōite wouldn’t know or wouldn't care about it.

 

I’ve mentioned before that the worship of Inari was originally tied to daimyō class. Inari was seen as a tutelary kami of the daimyō and his clan and retainers. With the implementation of 参勤交代 sankin-kōtai (alternate attendance), daimyō and their retainers were forced to maintain about 3 residences in the shōgun’s capital of Edo. Shiba, Mita, and Azabu were home to many 藩邸 hantei domain residences – also called 大名屋敷 daimyō yashiki (daimyō mansions). Important samurai families, 武家 buke, lived nearby the daimyō as this real estate was both prestigious and probably helped the shōgunate keep an eye on actions of the daimyō and his retainers.

 

Because of this the worship of Inari spread from the upper echelons of the samurai class down to the everyday samurai by a kind of proximity effect. So if I see an Inari Shrine in certain parts of Tōkyō, I will immediately check my maps to see what daimyō had which residence in on that land. Generally speaking, anyone with an internet connection can find this information in 2 minutes as the foundation of shrines and temples are pretty well documented.

 

So looking into the history of Mamiana Inari-sha led me to all sorts of dead ends. For two days I scoured the internet to find out what daimyō lived on this plot of land. I figured that we could assume the first daimyō on the property would have ritually transported and re-enshrined the kami from his ancestral lands to his “embassy” in Edo. And while the area around the park was surrounded by a few lavish daimyō residences, I couldn’t find anything.

 

 

Until I looked at a map. This particular side of this particular intersection at the bottom of rhis particular hill, Mamiana-zaka (Mamiana Hill), was not home to any daimyō. There were a few large high ranking samurai families living in this area. This means the shrine was most likely built on a private samurai residence. The land could have been bought out or confiscated by the Meiji Government, but a Shintō shrine would have understandably been left behind – after all, the new government was pushing Shintō over Buddhism in an effort to bolster its claim that the emperor was a Shintō god and therefore the rightful ruler of Japan, not the Tokugawa.

 

So who built this shrine? I wish I could tell you. Honestly, I can’t find much online about it and nothing in any of my books. And while the paths of the streets are more or less the same today, the current geography doesn’t line up with the Edo Period plots of residential land. Also modern map making techniques don’t always match up exactly with Edo Period maps… at least not the ones I have access to. So, I can’t tell you what family was living there (it’s most likely one of 3 families by my reckoning, but I’m not going to speculate further than that). I’m having a hard time even figuring out who built the many torii there, and who has filled in the cement reinforcements of the stone work, and who maintains the paint job on the torii and komainu. I’m not an expert on Japan’s separation of church and state laws, but while Minato Ward can pay for the upkeep of Mamiana Park, I don’t think they can constitutionally upkeep a shrine. So… this is a mystery in so many ways to me at the moment.

 

That said, there is a wonky folk tale about this area which involves this small shrine. If you read my blog, you already know some theories on the etymology of Mamiana. One involves a mami (a dialect term for a tanuki or a female tanuki).

 

The folk tale says there was a handsome commoner who lived here [in a cave here, for some reason] could take the shape of a tanuki and would sneak into Edo Castle and make his way straight to the 大奥 Ōoku (the shōgun’s harem) where he would ravish the shōgun’s women in ways that would make #TeamIenari cringe. Another samurai named Uchida Shōkurō (or possibly Masakurō or Seikurō) could see through this dude’s tanuki disguise and took it upon himself to slay the perverted shape-shifter in defense of the shōgun’s honor. Another story – sometimes tied in with the prior story – is that a soba shop owner named 作兵衛 Sakubei was saddened by the killing of a tanuki that he vowed to only serve “tanuki soba” (ie; soba served with tempura). On top of that, he built a small shrine to honor the soul of the slayed tanuki.

 

This folk tale is clearly bullshit, but interestingly, from Azabu-Jūban to Hamamatsu-chō there are many Edo Period soba shops.

Done