Amaterasu shuts the rock door

In the Kojiki, a Japanese chronicle of gods and early rulers, the Sun goddess, Amaterasu, hides in a cave after her brother's outrages, and darkness falls.

The story

In Chamberlain's 1882 translation, the Heaven-Shining-Great-August-Deity closes the door of the Heavenly Rock-Dwelling, and the plain of heaven and the land below go dark. The gods hang a mirror and jewels on a tree, a goddess stamps and dances on a sounding-board before the door, the gods laugh, and the curious Sun opens the door, is shown the mirror and comes out.

The text

Chamberlain dates the Kojiki to A.D. 712. The text itself does not call the darkness an eclipse; it is a story about light withdrawn and coaxed back.

Astrology and myth are presented here as symbolic and historical traditions, not as predictions. The sky's positions and times on this site are calculated the same way in every lens.