Ajisukitakahikone

Ajisukitakahikone appears in the Kojiki/Nihon Shoki narratives that treat the heavenly mandate to transfer rule of the terrestrial realm. Sources state he is a son of Ōkuninushi (with Tagori-hime named as his mother in some accounts) and that his stories occur in the mythic episodes around the heavenly envoys (including the figure Ame-no-Wakahiko). He is presented as a local tutelary figure in the Kamo cult tradition (later described in modern museum/catalog entries as Kamo no ōmikami) and as father of the rain god Takitsuhiko in the genealogical material.

Classical texts do not give an extended physical portrait; descriptions emphasize resemblance and radiance. He is said to have closely resembled Ame-no-Wakahiko (a likeness that causes mourners to mistake him for the dead). After destroying the funeral hut he is described as departing by flight while a radiance from him illuminated the space of two hills and two valleys. In infancy he is depicted as a loud-crying baby who was placed in a boat and sailed around the islands until calm.

Narrative episodes attribute to him spectacular but specific feats: infant cries linked mythically to the sound of growing thunder (the ladder-rocking episode); violent martial action as an adult—drawing a ten-span sword to destroy a funeral hut (moya), which the text says was hurled to Mino and became Moyama; the capacity to fly away after the incident; and a luminous radiance that illuminated a wide area upon his departure. He is also named as father of Takitsuhiko, a rain deity, indicating his place in meteorological genealogy.