[From Eeyan ! Osaka Shopping Street] A tragic love story that connects people through time at Tsuyunoten shrine

If you head south along Sonezaki Ohatsu Tenjin-dori Shopping Street , you will come across Tsuyunoten shrine, also known as Ohatsu Tenjin, after which the Shopping Street is named.

Tsuyunoten shrine became known as a place of love and romance because of the double suicide that took place in the Tenjin Forest within the shrine between Ohatsu, a prostitute from Dojima Shinchi Tenmaya, and Tokubei, a clerk at Uchihonmachi Hiranoya. Chikamatsu Monzaemon used this incident as the subject of his puppet theater play, "The Love Suicides at Sonezaki."

This tragic love story between a young man and woman moved people to tears, and many men and women began to visit Tsuyunoten shrine, the setting of the story.

It soon gained a reputation for helping two tragically-lost lovers reunite, and this eventually became the origin of the shrine's name as a place for matchmaking.

Tsuyunoten shrine was founded about 1,300 years ago. It is said that this was when Sonezaki was still one of the small islands floating in Osaka Bay. Tsuyunoten shrine was named after a poem that Sugawara no Michizane composed when he stopped in this area on his way to Dazaifu.

Walk through Sonezaki Ohatsutenjin-dori Shopping Street, which is the pilgrimage route to the shrine, and write your wish on a pink love fortune slip or a cute votive plaque to pray for love.

Sonezaki Ohatsutenjin Shopping Street

Tsuyunoten shrine

* Tsuyunoten shrine*

[Access] About 5 minutes walk from Umeda Station on the Osaka Metro Midosuji Line or Higashi-Umeda Station on the Tanimachi Line

[Opening hours] 6:00-24:00 (Shrine office 9:00-18:00)