=Take-minakata=, the deity of Suha in Shinano, may be a real ancestral deity. He is very popular at the present day. This God is not mentioned in the _Nihongi_, but his legend is given in the _Kojiki_[147] and _Kiujiki_. He was a son of Ohonamochi, who, after his father's submission, refused allegiance to the Sun-Goddess and fled to Suha, where he was obliged to surrender, his life being spared. Tradition says that the present Oho-hafuri, or chief priests of Suha, are direct descendants of this deity. The inhabitants hold that the God _is_ the Oho-hafuri, and that the Oho-hafuri _is_ the God. An oracle of the God is quoted to this effect: "I have no body, the _hafuri_ is my body." His house is called the _shinden_ or divine dwelling. He never leaves the neighbourhood, and takes precedence of the chief local official. At every change of office the newly appointed high priest formerly received a cap of honour and robes from the Palace of Kiôto. He takes no active part in the ceremonies of the annual festival, but sits on a chair in the middle of the sacred plot of ground and receives the obeisances of the people. This festival is called the _mi-hashira-matsuri_ or "festival of the august pillars." It is so called because instead of a shrine there is only a plot of ground containing a "rock-cave"[148] with a great wooden post at each of the four corners. =Hachiman=.--The War-God Hachiman is one of the most conspicuous of the later Shinto deities. His origin is really unknown, but he is placed provisionally among deified human beings in accordance with the accepted tradition which makes him identical with the very legendary Mikado Ôjin. The ultimate authority for this statement is an oracle of the God himself delivered hundreds of years after Ôjin's death. There is no mention of his worship in the _Kojiki_ or _Nihongi_, and the legends which carry it back to A.D. 570 are unworthy of credence. The original seat of this cult was Usa, in the province of Buzen, an old Shinto centre. Hachiman seems to have first come into notice in 720, when he rendered efficient assistance in repelling a descent of Koreans on Japan. Forty years later Kiyomaro, the founder of the great Minamoto family, made use of his oracles to thwart the ambitious projects of a priest named Dôkiô, the Wolsey of Japanese history. The rise of the Minamoto family carried with it that of the God who had been so useful to them. In Seiwa's reign (859-880) a temple was erected to him at Ihashimidzu near Kiôto, where he received Imperial presents, and even visits. In 1039 he was given a high place in the State religion.