Historical iconology of War Gods

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

This is the study into an ikusa-gami(military deity) in the middle and early-modern Japan and the related images from the perspective of historical iconography."Shogun jizo "is a military deity created as a consequence of the war among Shinto and Buddhist deities. Many of military governments and common people in the middle ages believed in shogun jizo in the context of the notions of nation and national land, which had considerable impact on the wars in the modern age and formation and development of nation state later on. The purpose of this study is to figure out the historical changes in the belief in shogun jizo and related images over the period of 800 years. In the course of the study, the author conducted research and collection covering all of the shogun jizos existing throughout Japan, made a database of those shogun jizos and crosschecked them with related historical sources and documents.Based on the above, the author clarified the history of 800 years including(1) origination of the belief in shogun jizo in the 13th century,(2) expansion of the belief and creation of related stories in the 14th century,(3) dissemination of the belief in Atago gongen in the 16th century,(4) expansion of shogun jizo as the god of fire prevention and(5) re-recognition as the military deity in the wars in the modern age, and found the new view that the belief in the god of water underlies the belief in shogun jizo and in the military deity in the medieval age.