In many regions, particularly in the mountain areas, there remains a folk practice of dressing up dolls they make from straw, earth or cloth and worshipping them as idols. The doll in the picture was reported by an Iwate resident. It is called Kushimi and when someone dies in the village, they weave the hair of the deceased into the straw and have it wear his or her kimono.
The doll is enshrined for up to one month after the death and after that period passes, it is cast into the river behind the shrine together with various offerings.
In this region's tradition, there is said to be a cave in the mountain connecting to the land of the gods. The dead who become Kushimi stand between the village and the mountain. They take upon the village's evil and head to the land of the gods.
In a neighboring village, there is said to be a similar doll called Igushi, but this one is a spirit of a person who died young and is deified in the mountains.
In one interpretation, both village and mountain have a protective deity standing in the border between people and gods. In another sense, burdening the dead with evil, or deifying the spirit of the young in a mountain, connotes human sacrifice.
Notes
While viewing this note in the menu you may view an image of the skewered dolls by pressing the O (circle)
button.
The full title of this note is "Skewered Dolls and Mountain Faiths".
Miku mentions to Rei that the dolls depicted in the photograph accompanying this note are similar
to the legends of the "Straw Dolls" passed on in Tōno, a city in the Iwate prefecture of Japan.