Staff and students of AMKY are writing about Japanese culture or something so Japanese from their own perspectives-スタッフと生徒が英語で紹介する「身近な日本文化」です。
A monument of a whale （鯨のモニュメント）
There is a small park next to the Kagata shrine in Higashishinagawa and a monument of a whale sticks out from the ground.
A whale strayed off into the waters off the Shinagawa coast in Edo (currently Tokyo), because of a rainstorm May 1st in 1798, in the Kansei era.
Fishermen in Shinagawa drove it into Tennousu and captured it. It was big whale and its length was about 16 meters and its height was about 2 meters.
Many people came there to see the whale. The news caused such a great sensation that the 11th general Ienari TOKUGAWA had a look at it at Hama Imperial Villa (currently Hama Royal Garden).
But the whale weakened and died because it had been captured for a long time. Its bones were buried within the Kagata Shrine grounds.
And they built a mound on the place and held a memorial service. It still remains as the kujirazuka (Mound for Whales).
東品川の利田（かがた）神社の隣に小さな公園があって、鯨の形をしたオブジェが地面から突き出しています。
寛政10年（1798年）5月1日に、暴風雨で一頭の鯨が品川沖に迷い込みました。
品川の漁師たちがそれを天王洲に追い込み捕獲すると、体長が約16m、高さが約2mある大鯨でした。
多くの人々がその鯨をひと目見たさに集まり、11代将軍徳川家斉が浜御殿（現在の浜離宮恩賜庭園）で上覧されるほどの大騒ぎとなりました。
しかし、長い間の係留で鯨は弱り死んでしまい、鯨の骨は東品川の利田（かがた）神社境内に埋められました。
その上に碑を建て手厚く供養され、現在も「鯨塚」として残っています。
Ikuyo.K.
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