Ise holds one of the most important Shinto shrines in Japan. Enshrining the ancestral gods of the Imperial family, it has a long and varied political career. Such was its power that even stingy Oda Nobunaga felt obliged to donate huge sums of money to revive the custom of reconstructing the shrines -- an event that had not taken place throughout the previous 100 years.
This process of reconstruction is the theme of the present volume, as the subtitle attests: "ancient but new." The author finds this a "marvelous paradox, unparalleled anywhere in the world, namely brand new buildings that are more than 1,300 years old; new in material, but ancient in form and spirit."
Every 20 years on alternating plots, the main Ise shrine is torn down and a new one, in every way identical, is constructed next door. The next renewal, the 62nd, will take place in 2013. Though the Ise shrines are not the only ones to practice this kind of immortality (Kyoto's Kamo Shrines are supposed to be rebuilt every 50 years, Izumo Taisha every once in a while), it is the only one that has done so regularly.