Kamon (family crests) and the mitsudomoe
Kamon are Japanese family crests: small badges of a plant, a bird, an object or a pattern, often set in a circle and worn on formal dress. The mitsudomoe, three comma shapes swirling in a ring, is one of the commonest, on shrines and on drums.
Meaning
Basil Hall Chamberlain, writing in 1905, compared Japanese crests (mon) to European heraldry but noted one difference: anyone could have one, tradesmen as well as nobles. A great daimyō had three crests, a lesser daimyō two and a samurai one. In war they marked the breastplate, the helmet and the flag; in peace the crest was worn in five places on formal dress, at the back of the neck, on each sleeve and on each breast, and put on lanterns and travelling cases. Chamberlain lists the motifs: bamboo, roses, peonies and even radishes, birds, butterflies, running water, fans, feathers, ladders, bridle bits, Chinese characters and geometric patterns. Shrine crests, the Encyclopedia of Shinto says, are used everywhere in Japan today.
Origin and history
Kokugakuin University’s Encyclopedia of Shinto says the first shrine crests are thought to have appeared at about the same time as family crests, with some shrines taking crests from their foundation stories by the late Heian period and many more taking them up in the Kamakura period. Crests passed both ways: a shrine might adopt a family’s crest, and a family a shrine’s.
Famous crests
The sixteen-petalled chrysanthemum is one of the imperial family’s two crests; the other is the paulownia. The Tokugawa shoguns used three asarum (aoi) leaves meeting in the middle, and the Shimazu of Satsuma a cross in a circle. One small daimyō, Aoki, had for his crest the peak of Fuji rising from the clouds (Chamberlain).
The mitsudomoe
The tomoe is a comma-shaped swirl, and the Encyclopedia of Shinto calls it a typical shrine crest. It was the crest of Hachiman shrines and spread widely in the medieval period, as warrior families founded Hachiman shrines of their own. A crest may have one, two or three tomoe, and three is the commonest. Henri Joly, cataloguing Japanese art in 1908, found the mitsudomoe, three commas whose points stretch round to make a circle, on drums, where it was held to stand for luck and good fortune. It is also on the drums of Raijin, the thunder god.
Shrine crests
Each shrine has a crest, the encyclopedia explains: a kind of logo displayed at its entrance, chosen for a legend of its kami, the name of the place or the shrine, or the family crest of its priests. Counting the smallest wayside shrines, the commonest crest is probably sheaves of rice, the inemon, because so many Inari shrines took it up. Kitano Tenmangū in Kyoto has a plum blossom, because its kami, Sugawara no Michizane, loved plums.
Often confused with
The mokkō crest, used by the Yasaka Shrine and other shrines of the kami Susanoo, is often taken for a cucumber cut across, the Encyclopedia of Shinto notes, though its name means “melon”.
Read next
- Next in Japanese symbolsChrysanthemum seal (imperial crest)The crest of Japan’s imperial family: a chrysanthemum seen from the front, with sixteen petals and the tips of a second row between them. The same flower is on the cover of the Japanese passport.
- The same shape in Adinkra symbolsBese SakaBese Saka, a bunch of kola nuts, is the adinkra symbol of affluence, abundance and unity.
See also
Torii (shrine gate), Komainu (guardian lion-dogs), Amaterasu (the sun kami), Raijin and Fūjin (thunder and wind), Mount Fuji, Japanese dragon (ryū).
Sources
- Basil Hall Chamberlain, Things Japanese (1905), Basil Hall Chamberlain, Things Japanese: Being Notes on Various Subjects Connected with Japan, fifth edition, London: John Murray, 1905, John Murray (Internet Archive, University of Toronto copy), pp. 222–223, “Heraldry”
- Shinmon (Encyclopedia of Shinto), Encyclopedia of Shinto, Kokugakuin University, “Shinmon” (Inoue Nobutaka), Kokugakuin University, entry text
- Henri L. Joly, Legend in Japanese Art (1908), Henri L. Joly, Legend in Japanese Art: A Description of Historical Episodes, Legendary Characters, Folk-lore, Myths, Religious Symbolism Illustrated in the Arts of Old Japan, London: John Lane, 1908, John Lane (Internet Archive, University of Toronto copy), no. 112, “Cock on drum”
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from circles or curves and waves.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 10, 2026. How we research
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