Shigaraki is a small pottery town in the middle of Shiga's countryside, but it is a town with a long and interesting history. Shigaraki became the Imperial capital for a few months in the year 745, but the Imperial court moved after the palace was burned down in a forest fire. However the really curious thing about Shigaraki is that everywhere you look there are cute pottery raccoon dogs known as tanuki.There seems to be a number of interesting stories about these tanuki. For example, once when the emperor visited the town the local people were concerned that they were too few in number to provide a rousing welcome for their illustrious guest, so they got the idea of lining up hundreds of tanuki on the sides of the road. I bet that made the emperor smile!
- 1 min read
Shigaraki
Town of the tanuki statues
By Cathy Cawood
Community writer
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Bonson Lam
9 years ago
Shigaraki is a little gem between Nagoya and Kyoto on the Shin Meishin motorway, making this a great stop for your New Year holidays!
Justin Velgus
10 years ago
It is all fun and games during the daytime, but it looks like this town can get a little scary after dark!
Anonymous
10 years ago
While the rest of my family thinks they are fearsome or gross, I've always had a fascination with tannuki statues and set about several years ago to try to find the best place to buy one. Never did get a satisfying source, and the selection of those online at Rakuten are really disappointing -- mostly cheap-looking and with the same boring expression. Soooo, Cathy has done a great service by identifying not just a single factory but in fact an entire town dedicated to recreating tannuki tengoku in the world of humans. Definitely going to put Shiragaki on my list of places to go!
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