四国霊場と自然 - 神木，自然景観，寺紋について -

In order to understand relations between the 88-temple pilgrimage in Shikoku Island and the nature around
the pilgrimage route，we made comprehensive research on the temples from the 1st to 5th of the 88 temples and
the Ooasahiko Shrine (the most respected shrine and is neighboring to the Ryozenji Temple).
In this report，we describe about following three points; 1) history of sacred trees，2) history of landscape
and 3) crests of the temples. As for the first point，there are big sacred trees in the shrine and the two temples，a
camphor tree in the Ooasahiko Shrine，a cedar tree in the Gokurakuji Temple，that is called "long-life cedar"
and a ginkgo tree in the Jizoji Temple that is called “mother's breast ginkgo". However，we could find a few
records on them written in old literatures. A distinct tree in the picture written in Edo era may be identical to the
ginkgo tree of the Jizoji Temple. As for the second point，pine forests were dominant in the mountains around
the shrine and the temples in Edo era，however，they have almost completely disappeared due to pine wilt
disease. Moreover，fields of indigo and sugar cane along with the route of the pilgrimage in Edo era have also
disappeared，and now orchards are conspicuous in this area. As for the last point，all five temples use plants as
their crest，the flower of paulownia tree in the Ryozenji Temple and the Gokurakuji Temple，the flower of
chrysanthemum in the Konsenji Temple，the flower of Tachibana in the Dainichiji Temple and the pine tree in
the Jizoji Temple. Since there is no detailed research on the crests of the 88 temples further investigation is
expected.