Description

The polished side of this eight-pointed mirror has an incised design of the kami Takemikazuchi riding on a deer from Kashima to Mount Mikasa, where he takes up residence. Although the mirror itself could have been produced as early as the 1300s, the incised line work has a fresh quality more consistent with later works, and the image may have been executed as late as the 1600s–1800s. Unlike most painted images of the episode, this incised one includes neither the sakaki tree branch supporting the Buddhist manifestations of the five Kasuga kami, nor Takemikazuchi’s companions. The back of the mirror has a design of two phoenixes.