Hirado & Ikitsuki
Atlas / Hirado & Ikitsuki
Terraced rice fields beneath a sacred mountain, in the region where the old hidden prayers are still remembered.
In Kasuga, on Hirado island, Hidden Christians worshipped the landscape itself: Mt. Yasumandake and other sacred places stood in for churches they could not have. The village and its terraces are a UNESCO component.
On Hirado and neighbouring Ikitsuki some families continued the hidden traditions even after 1873, without rejoining the Catholic Church. Their prayers (orasho), hanging scrolls and rites are documented at the Ikitsuki Island Museum, Shima no Yakata.
