Izumo (Japanese: 出雲国; Izumo-no-kuni) was an old province of
Japan which today consists of the eastern part of Shimane
prefecture in the Chūgoku region. The origin of the word "Izumo" is from the name
of the goddess Izanami. She is the mother of Japan and buried on Mt. Hiba, at the border of the
old provinces of Izumo and Hoki, near modern-day Yasugi of Shimane Prefecture.
It was one of the regions of ancient Japan where major political powers arose. A powerful clan of Izumo (Idumo is an
obsolete romanization) constituted an independent polity, but during the fourth century BC it was absorbed due to the expansion
of the state of Yamato, within which it assumed the role of a sacerdotal domain. Even
today the Izumo Shrine constitutes (as does the Grand Shrine
of Ise) one of the more important sacred places of Shinto: it is dedicated to
kami, especially to Ōkuninushi
(Ō-kuni-nushi-no-mikoto), mythical progeny of Susa-no-Ō and all the clans of Izumo.
By the Sengoku period, Izumo had lost much of its importance. It was dominated before the
Battle of Sekigahara by the Mori clan, and after
Sekigahara, it was an independent fief with a castle town at modern Matsue.
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
