Home » 4. Jinja (Shrines) » Ritual Implements and Vestments
Shide | |
One type of heihaku, formed by attaching flowing strips of paper or cloth (particularly yū, rough cloth made from the bast fibers of paper mulberry) to a sprig of sakaki, a staff, or a sacred border rope (Shimenawa). Although yū was formerly used, most shide today are made of paper. A variety of methods are used to fold and cut the strips, including those with 2, 4, and 8 folds. Shide are likewise found in a variety of specific styles, the best known of which would include those of Ise, Shirakawa, and Yoshida. Nowadays shide are most frequently found as one component of implements of purification, but they are also suspended from sacred border ropes demarcating sacred or ritual space, in which case they serve to symbolize a sacred border. A Grand Champion (yokozuna) of sumō wrestling wears a decorative shimenawa festooned with shide around his ornamental belt during the ring-entrance ceremonies of a sumō tournament. See also heihaku, shimenawa.
-Inoue Nobutaka |
Shide attached to an auxiliary shrine on the grounds of Yasaka Jinja.
Ibaraki Prefecture, 2007 ©Ōsawa Kōji |
Date : 2005/ 6/ 2(Thu) Times Viewed : 16449
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