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Tamayori-hime (mother of Jimmu)

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Tamayori-hime is the daughter of the sea-dragon god Watatsumi and the younger sister of Toyotama-hime. When Toyotama-hime abandoned her husband Hoori, she sent Tamayori-hime to care for their son Ugayafukiaezu, although in the Nihon Shoki version of the legend, Tamayori-hime accompanies her sister to the human world when she was about to give birth. When the child grew up, he married his aunt, who bore him four children, the youngest of which became Emperor Jimmu, the first emperor of Japan.

Summary

She is the mother of Emperor Jimmu (the first Emperor) and the sister of Toyotama-hime, the Emperor's grandmother. Toshio Akima of the International Research Centre for Japanese Studies considers it more likely that Tamayori-hime is not the sister of Toyotama-hime, but that the two should be considered as aspects of the same, single deity.

The word tamayori-hime is a generic term for shamanesses who dedicated their lives exclusively to their deities. The Japanese folklorist Kunio Yanagita espoused the view that tamayori-hime means "a consecrated women to whom a spirit descends" and that the intimate relationships between the two helped generate belief in mother-son pair deities. In addition, since the line of succession is based on grain spirits, and the sons of Tamayorihime are also named Gose no mikoto (厳稲の命), Inahiron no mikoto (稲氷の命), Mogonuma no mikoto (御食主の命), and Wakamogonuma no mikoto (若御食主の命), it is thought that they were priestesses who possessed grain spirits.

Miyaura Shrine (Miyazaki Prefecture Nichinan City) is said to be the site of Tamayorihime's residence. There is also a place in Miyazaki Prefecture Nichinan City that is said to be the mausoleum of Princess Tamayori.

At the Ryūkomyō Shrine, she is considered the ancestor of the Kaijin Tribe, which unites Ryujin, and the princess herself is worshipped as Ryujin.

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