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Kirishima Kinkowan NP, Kagoshima
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The 3-m torii was buried in a single day in 1914; only its top now shows. Mayor Yaozo Nozoe stopped villagers from digging it out, preserving the eruption’s aftermath as a warning for future generations.
The shrine association records that all 687 homes in Kurokami were buried in 1914. The shrine was overwhelmed as well: some recovered sacred images were scorched, while undamaged figures are still enshrined there.
The torii has a stone companion: a nearby household’s gateposts, originally 2.5 m high, were buried in the same eruption. Both the torii and posts are made of jointless rhyolite and were designated prefectural natural monuments in 1958.
Most shrine-grove trees died under 1914 ash, but some old sudajii (Japanese chinquapin) trunks survived and resprouted, helping rebuild the canopy. A Kagoshima museum study identifies this as Sakurajima’s only sudajii stand.
Haragoshisha Shrine still holds annual festivals on the old lunar calendar’s March 17 and September 27. The shrine association says its founding dates back about 350 years—a long history behind this striking eruption record.
