The Enthronement of the Tennō
Today is a national holiday in Japan, to celebrate the enthronement of the Tennō. The enthronement ceremony itself happened at 1 pm, with heads of state from around the world in attendance. And it had nothing to do with Shinto. The enthronement ceremony has, in fact, never had anything to do with Shinto. It was originally copied from Chinese models, and until the late nineteenth century, everyone wore traditional Chinese official robes for it. (By the late nineteenth century, those robes may have been a thousand years out of date… Read More »The Enthronement of the Tennō