Iwatate Shrine 巖立神社

In mid-September, the shrine holds an annual festival that includes kagura performances—sacred dances performed for the deities and accompanied by drums, flutes, and gongs. Shrine maidens (miko) and masked dancers perform on a small tatami stage surrounded by the audience. Many of the dances depict stories from folklore or mythology, and the performance culminates in the popular lion dance, an acrobatic portrayal of a confrontation between a guardian lion-dog (shishi) and a long-nosed goblin (tengu).

The main approach to the shrine is lined with lantern-topped stone walls and sheltered by the boughs of the primeval forest. Now a designated cultural property of Nagasaki Prefecture, the forest is thought to have survived because of a long-standing prohibition against saws and hatchets on shrine grounds, which was put in place out of respect for the spirits of the trees.