Nisho Tenshokodaijin senko jidai sho (A Collection of the Divine Progress Through the Ages of Tenshokodaijin)

According to the two early national chronicles of Japan, Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, the Japanese imperial family claims descent—and their divine right to rule—from the Shintō sun goddess Tenshokodaijin, better known as Amaterasu. Shintō is the indigenous religion of Japan, and Amaterasu is depicted in the second illustration, displayed here. This scroll records and illustrates accounts of the religious rituals known as Sengū, or Senko, which take place at irregular intervals during an emperor’s reign. Sengū involves the building of a new shrine and the relocation of the deity, represented by the circular motif. The text to the right of each image addresses the place and date of each shrine’s construction and its rituals of worship, and in four instances lists the emperor’s name and a year during his reign. The manuscript is written in the kanbun style, a method of annotating Classical Chinese so that it can be read in Japanese, that was used from the Heian period (794–1185) to the mid-20th century.