Ikuta Shrine 生田神社
In 806 the court assigned 44 families to the shrine: their name gave rise to ‘Kobe’.
The shrine burned in the bombing of Kobe on 17 March 1945 and collapsed again in the earthquake of 17 January 1995: it was rebuilt in a year and a half, with the worship hall raised on twenty-six reinforced concrete pillars, so much so that residents call it ‘the shrine that is reborn’. The city's very name comes from here: in 806 the court assigned to its worship 44 families called kanbe, that is, households bound to maintain it with offerings and labour, and over the centuries ‘kanbe’ turned into the name ‘Kōbe’. In 1184 the shrine's woods were a battlefield between the Genji and Heike clans (Minamoto and Taira): the well is still there where the warrior Kajiwara Kagesue drew water while praying for victory, after slipping a branch of flowering plum into his quiver.
Hyogo
Sannomiya, Kobe-Sannomiya, Sannomiya
