A Visit to the Iwaya Caves of Enoshima

Or, A Conradian Reflection Upon the Phenomena of Modern Travel.

 

A View of Enoshima, by Yuichi Takahashi (c.1876-1877)

In his ‘Preface’ to Richard Curle’s Into the East (1923), an account of Curle’s travels in Burma and British Malaya, Joseph Conrad lamented the transition of travel writing from an era of intrepid voyaging, adventuring curiosity, and philanthropical reportage to a new and stupefying age of mass tourism: ‘… those things, which stand as if imperishable in the pages of old books of travel, are all blown away, have vanished utterly as the smoke of the travellers’ camp fires in the icy night air of the Gobi Desert, as the smell of incense burned in the temples of strange gods, as the voices of Asiatic statesmen speculating with the cruel wisdom of past ages on matters of peace and war.

Nothing obviously strange remains for our eyes now.’ (p. 90)

Enoshima, by Ogata Gekko (c.1895-1905)

Conrad wrote these orientalising, elegiac words late in his life. This particular ‘Preface,’ along with another essay which was published the following year in the National Geographic Magazine, show Conrad looking back on the events of his own life and career, prompting him to reflect upon his place in this changing tradition. A tradition which he believed was characterised by a clear sense of cultural evolution in terms of human exploration from ancient to modern times. In this essay, entitled ‘Geography and Some Explorers,’ he famously distilled this peculiarly inquisitive, globetrotting endeavour into three developmental phases: first, Geography fabulous; second, Geography militant; third, and finally, Geography triumphant.

 

Joseph Conrad (1923)

Geography fabulous was graphically represented by medieval maps crowded ‘with pictures of strange pageants, strange trees, strange beasts, drawn with amazing precision in the midst of theoretically conceived continents. […] regions infested by lions or haunted by unicorns, inhabited by men with reversed feet, or eyes in the middle of their breasts.’ (p. 2) A Mappa Mundi-like world of awful mystery and extravagant speculation, but, nevertheless, a world of gradually expanding horizons, best characterised by the early wanderings of Prince Henry the Navigator’s Portuguese caravels skirting along newly-seen African coastlines, venturing into these ‘blank’ (or hitherto unknown) spaces, progressively advancing the boundaries of portolan charts dotted with compass roses from which radiated the rhumb lines upon which mariners set their courses. The Old World’s ‘discovery’ of the New precipitated an epochal shift that permanently altered both European and non-European planetary consciousness in different ways. Conrad’s view of Christopher Columbus is interesting when read in the context of recent and somewhat controversial claims concerning Columbus’s ancestry (Genoese Christian, or secretly Jewish Spaniard?), as well as on-going de-colonial debates about how Columbus’s legacy should or shouldn’t be remembered in our own times. Conrad opines that: ‘Columbus remains a pathetic figure, not a sufferer in the cause of geography, but a victim of the imperfections of jealous human hearts, accepting his fate with resignation. Among explorers he appears lofty in his troubles and like a man of a kingly nature. His contribution to the knowledge of the earth was certainly royal. And if the discovery of America was the occasion of the greatest outburst of reckless cruelty and greed known to history we may say this at least for it, that the gold of Mexico and Peru, unlike the gold of alchemists, was really there, palpable, yet, as ever, the most elusive of the Fata Morgana that lure men away from their homes, as a moment of reflection will convince any one. For nothing is more certain than that there will never be enough gold to go round, as the Conquistadores found out by experience.’ (p. 3)

European-led exploration opened up routes for exploitation and the succeeding phase of Geography militant became a defining aspect of the early modern period (previously referred to as ‘the Enlightenment’) of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. From the personal point of view of individual explorers, it was characterised by an arduous seeking for the confirmation of certain theories proffered and stubbornly maintained by learned armchair geographers, as Conrad characterised them, who ‘did not seem able to accept the idea that there was much more water than land on this globe.’ (p. 6) Thus the most renowned navigators of this era, men such as Amerigo Vespucci, Ferdinand Magellan, and Abel Tasman, roamed the oceans, circumnavigating the globe, searching its southernmost latitudes in pursuit of an elusive ‘Terra Australis Incognita’; until the more refined scientific exploits of this long tradition of great men, running through the efforts of Captain James Cook and Sir John Franklin at sea, and, on land, the endeavours of Messrs Burton and Speke, and Dr David Livingstone, who collectively rounded off this heroic era, successfully transitioned us into the modern age of Geography triumphant. Another distinctly masculine and assertively imperialist age in which, as Conrad saw it, ‘there will be no backyard left in the heart of Central Africa that has not been peeped into by some person more or less commissioned for the purpose.’ (p. 89) Citing, as a kind of self-conscious footnote to this era, the example of his own career as a merchant sailor in the romantic last days of sailing ships, wherein it was his ‘duty to correct and bring up to date the charts of more than one ship according to the Admiralty notices.’ (p. 14)

As needs must, however, Conrad observed that travel writing in his day had changed because travel and the modern-day traveller had changed. These three phases of questing geographical endeavour had clearly succeeded in shrinking the globe, and so the game was almost up. Hence a writer like Richard Curle, according to Conrad’s estimation, represented ‘a traveller of our day, condemned to make his discoveries on beaten tracks, he looks on, sensitive, meditative, with delicate perceptions and a gift for expression, alive to the saving grace of human and historical associations; and while pursuing amongst the men busy with ascertained facts the riddles presented by a world in transition, he seems to have captured for us the spirit of modern travel itself.’ (p. 92)

 

Now, exactly one hundred years after these words were freshly penned by Conrad, oddly enough they still seem indelibly apposite; has anything really changed in terms of travel and tourism in our increasingly globalised world? – Some might argue that the fortunes of travel writing and the popularity of travel writers has ebbed and flowed significantly during this century of accelerated development. But some might say that on the whole it has always been in a steady decline, like an echo of diminishing returns, travel writing in a sense has simply become a prolonged, self-repeating parody of itself – so much so, in fact, that it has essentially become redundant.

 

Conrad certainly thought so: ‘That category of travellers with their parrot-like remarks, their strange attempts at being funny, and their lamentable essays in seriousness has apparently passed away. Or perhaps they only print their books for circulation amongst friends. I suspect, however, they have ceased to write simply because there are too many of them. They do not appear as travellers even to the most naïve minds and perhaps even to their own minds. They are simply an enormous company of people who go round the world for a change and rest, either suffering from overwork (whatever that may mean) or from neurasthenia. And I am sure my best wishes go with them for an easy and radical recovery. Steamship companies love them.’ (p. 86)

 

Indeed, modern mass tourism and the increasing prevalence of social media has redefined the world and people’s perceptions of their place and how they interact within it. Perhaps, as Conrad seems to suggest, travel writing had a greater sense of authenticity in an era when fewer people travelled. Traveller’s tales may well have served a different and more vital social function in such times, whether those tales were first imbibed by simply listening to their retelling in the quayside inns of port towns or avidly devoured in the pages of popularly published travelogues. For those who did not go to sea and so were not able to savour the wider world firsthand, such texts were the only means to push back the bounds of their horizons and get a taste of the furthest reaches of the globe.

 

But not all travelogues have stood the test of time, many have long since fallen by the way. According to Conrad: ‘The outstanding figure amongst those men who dedicated their books of travel to popes and emperors is Marco Polo, with his meticulous descriptive gift, his cautious credulity, his eye for splendour and his historian’s rather than a traveller’s temperament. He gave his readers what the readers of that day wanted, historical facts in a foreign and gorgeous atmosphere. But the time for such books of travel is past on this earth girt about with cables, with an atmosphere made restless by the waves of ether, lighted by that sun of the twentieth century under which there is nothing new left now, and but very little of what may still be called obscure.’ (p. 88)

 

Nowadays everyone is a travel writer of sorts. But today images appear to be more important than words. Self-presentation has become a means of projection as much as reflection. Without really knowing it, perhaps, it strikes me that people have now become their own versions of Alan Whicker or Michael Palin. Social media is not so much a window on the world, but rather a window into our own worlds – shaped, defined and presented as we ourselves would wish others to see it, thereby fanning our own solipsistic vanity! – The world is now girded with fibre optic cables and the ether buzzes a relay back and forth between encircling satellites, transmitting millions of ‘selfies’ from tourist hotspots around the globe. Pixelating the present for posterity; each of us harnessing the here and now of the twenty-first century via our camera-phones. The present moment has in effect become a single unending photographic image, capturing and arresting the falling domino-like effect of time. Freeze-framing our lives and the world which we have ostensibly ventured out into, in order to explore for ourselves, in search of rest or a change – a panacea for that universal yearning for self-fulfilment and the need for self-expression; a universal Instagram account viewable by all in lieu of an album of holiday snaps, or perhaps in lieu of a travel diary, or a ship’s captain’s log.

 

Crafting itineraries from Rough Guides, Lonely Planets, and Time Out’s seemingly inexhaustible supply of lists advising on the ‘Ten Best Places to …’, etc., these are the means by which we now measure and triangulate our own personal journeys of discovery. Bookish gurus such as Bill Bryson, Peter Mayle, Cheryl Strayed, Elizabeth Gilbert, et al., still provide traditional vade mecums of sorts to help us ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ our way around the globe with a hope of ameliorating our own modern-day neurasthenia. Hence the tradition of travel writing is far from defunct, rather it continues to do what it has always done; it’s perhaps the mode and the medium through which we engage with and respond to it which has reconfigured itself – as needs must.

A View of Enoshima, by Hokusai, Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (c.1830)

 

All of these thoughts passed through my mind only a few weekends ago when I took the train from Shinjuku to Fujisawa in order to visit Enoshima, just along the coast from Kamakura here in Japan, where I am currently living. Enoshima is an island of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples which has long been a place of pilgrimage, particularly during the Edo Period (1600-1868); but, since the early twentieth century, tourism has been the predominant religion of most ‘pilgrims’ visiting this special place in modern times. Like so many religious ‘tourist hotspots’ in Japan, Enoshima exudes a kind of otherworldly spiritual enchantment. ‘There is a charm indefinable about the place—that sort of charm which comes with a little ghostly thrill never to be forgotten,’ as the writer, Lafcadio Hearn described it in 1894. ‘Not of strange sights alone is this charm made, but of numberless subtle sensations and ideas interwoven and inter-blended: the sweet sharp scents of grove and sea; the blood-brightening, vivifying touch of the free wind; the dumb appeal of ancient mystic mossy things; vague reverence evoked by knowledge of treading soil called holy for a thousand years; and a sense of sympathy, as a human duty, compelled by the vision of steps of rock worn down into shapelessness by the pilgrim feet of vanished generations.’ (pp. 94-95)

 

The island’s main shrine complex is dedicated to the Goddess Benzaiten or Benten, and mythology also credits the island as being watched over by a once wrathful dragon who was tamed by the goddess and later became her spouse. Benten, as manifested in the Shinto and Buddhist traditions of Japan, is related to the Hindu Goddess, Saraswati. She is a Dharmapala, or Dharma protector. And, like Saraswati, strumming her lute-like biwa in many of her effigies, she is the patron of music, the arts, eloquence, and knowledge. But, unlike Saraswati, in Japan she also has other associations too, thought to have derived from early associations with local gods or kami in different regions. Through one of these associations, she came to be viewed as a water deity, hence her association with dragons and snakes, as well as with wealth, fortune, protection from disease and danger, and the protection of the state. The association with water means that many of the shrines dedicated to Benten can often be found situated on islands; one such example, which has a personal connection for me, is the Benten-dō which stands on a small island at the centre of Shinobazu Pond in Tokyo’s Ueno, close to where I stayed on many of my earliest trips to Japan over twenty years ago. Given this personal affinity and the fact that I was born in the year of the Dragon, Enoshima seemed to be a place which should have a unique resonance for me, and in many ways, I found it did – perhaps all the more unexpectedly in the form of certain ‘ghostly’ echoes of home.

Benzaiten Seated on a White Dragon, by Aoigaoka Keisei (1832)

 

Seeing Enoshima for the first time from the shoreline, rising up in the form of a high, tree-covered mound with the rooftops of buildings peeping out from the green foliage, I couldn’t help thinking how much it reminded me of my hometown, Harrow-on-the-Hill, near London; which, similarly, is cloaked by tall trees and topped by a church with a tall spire, built and consecrated by Saint Anselm on a spot which is thought to have long been a religious site, since pre-Christian times even. In the twilight of the Edo Period, the famous artist, Hokusai, depicted Enoshima in one of his series of woodblock prints, entitled ‘Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji.’ In this view a pagoda can be seen piercing the greenery, but today those trees are now more prominently parted by a tall lighthouse and observation tower known as the ‘Enoshima Sea Candle.’ Like other sacred islands throughout the world, such as Saint Michael’s Mount in Cornwall, or the Holy Island of Lindisfarne, situated just off the coast of Northumbria back home in England, Enoshima is a tidal island, which is connected to the mainland by a sand bar or tombolo at low tide. This has since been built over by a twin set of parallel bridges, one for the convenience of those travelling on foot and the other for those travelling by car or coach, making it accessible at all times and tides for pilgrims and day-trippers alike.

 

Ambling across this bridge, there are still echoes of Lafcadio Hearn’s visit to be found as you arrive on Enoshima: ‘We pass the sand-flats; and the ever-open Portal of the Sea-city, the City of the Dragon-goddess, is before us, a beautiful torii. All of bronze it is, with shimenawa of bronze above it, and a brazen tablet inscribed with characters declaring: 'This is the Palace of the Goddess of Enoshima.' About the bases of the ponderous pillars are strange designs in relievo, eddyings of waves with tortoises struggling in the flow. […] High before us slopes the single street, a street of broad steps, a street shadowy, full of multi-coloured flags and dank blue drapery dashed with white fantasticalities, which are words, fluttered by the sea wind. It is lined with taverns and miniature shops. At every one I must pause to look; and to dare to look at anything in Japan is to want to buy it. […] This curious street ends at another torii, a wooden torii, with a steeper flight of stone steps ascending to it. At the foot of the steps are votive stone lamps and a little well, and a stone tank at which all pilgrims wash their hands and rinse their mouths before approaching the temples of the gods.’ (pp. 86-88)

 

But different to Hearn’s day, there is now a set of three escalators which can comfortably whisk the weary pilgrim to the highest heights of the shrine, which is actually composed of a number of shrine buildings situated on several different levels. Three of these, the Hetsumiya, Nakatsumiya, and Okutsumiya, are dedicated to the three sister goddesses of the sea, of happiness and fortune, and of musical skills. The Yasaka Shrine is dedicated to Gozu Tenno, the guardian deity of Yasaka Shrine in Kyoto, and the Hoanden is an octagonal hall which houses two important Japanese ‘cultural assets’: two revered statues of Benzaiten – the Hadaka (or naked) Benzaiten, and the Happi (or eight-armed) Benzaiten.

Pilgrimage to the Iwaya Cave Shrine of Benzaiten, by Hiroshige (c.1850)

 

Another important site on the island, also with historical associations to Benzaiten, is the Iwaya Sea Caves, located low down on the island’s western shoreline. Eroded by the inexorable crash of ocean waves over unfathomable aeons of geological time, the first cave is a gallery 152 metres long which splits into two at its farthest end, and the second cave is formed of two interlinked galleries, each of around 56 metres in length. My Rough Guide is very dismissive of these caves, saying: ‘Though it’s an attractive walk, you might want to give these very artificial grottoes, with their piped music and roaring dragons, a miss.’ (p. 260) – Personally, I’d advise giving the jaded Rough Guide author a miss on this occasion, and listen instead to Lafcadio Hearn’s far more evocative description: ‘… the Dragon cavern, not so called, Akira [Hearn’s local guide] says, because the Dragon of Benten ever dwelt therein, but because the shape of the cavern is the shape of a dragon. The path descends toward the opposite side of the island, and suddenly breaks into a flight of steps cut out of the pale hard rock—exceedingly steep, and worn, and slippery, and perilous—overlooking the sea. A vision of low pale rocks, and surf bursting among them, and a toro or votive stone lamp in the centre of them—all seen as in a bird's-eye view, over the verge of an awful precipice. I see also deep, round holes in one of the rocks. There used to be a tea-house below; and the wooden pillars supporting it were fitted into those holes. I descend with caution; the Japanese seldom slip in their straw sandals, but I can only proceed with the aid of the guide. At almost every step I slip. Surely these steps could never have been thus worn away by the straw sandals of pilgrims who came to see only stones and serpents!

At last we reach a plank gallery carried along the face of the cliff above the rocks and pools, and following it round a projection of the cliff enter the sacred cave. The light dims as we advance; and the sea-waves, running after us into the gloom, make a stupefying roar, multiplied by the extraordinary echo. Looking back, I see the mouth of the cavern like a prodigious sharply angled rent in blackness, showing a fragment of azure sky.

We reach a shrine with no deity in it, pay a fee; and lamps being lighted and given to each of us, we proceed to explore a series of underground passages. So black they are that even with the light of three lamps, I can at first see nothing. In a while, however, I can distinguish stone figures in relief—chiselled on slabs like those I saw in the Buddhist graveyard. These are placed at regular intervals along the rock walls. The guide approaches his light to the face of each one, and utters a name, 'Daikoku-Sama,' 'Fudo-Sama,' 'Kwannon-Sama.' Sometimes in lieu of a statue there is an empty shrine only, with a money-box before it; and these void shrines have names of Shintō gods, 'Daijingu,' 'Hachiman,' 'Inari-Sama.' All the statues are black, or seem black in the yellow lamplight, and sparkle as if frosted. I feel as if I were in some mortuary pit, some subterranean burial-place of dead gods. Interminable the corridor appears; yet there is at last an end—an end with a shrine in it—where the rocky ceiling descends so low that to reach the shrine one must go down on hands and knees. And there is nothing in the shrine. This is the Tail of the Dragon.

We do not return to the light at once, but enter into other lateral black corridors—the Wings of the Dragon. More sable effigies of dispossessed gods; more empty shrines; more stone faces covered with saltpetre; and more money-boxes, possible only to reach by stooping, where more offerings should be made. And there is no Benten, either of wood or stone.’ (pp. 92-94)

Lafcadio Hearn (1891)

 

Though this was once the hallowed place where the first of the Kamakura Shoguns, Minamoto no Yoritomo (1147-1199), came to pray to Benten for victory in battle, and though the Benten statues have long since been removed for their safe-keeping higher up the island, the cave is still lined with votive statues and a small shrine can still be found by pious pilgrims and tourists alike at the end of its furthest reach. If you feel a cool breeze emanating from the inaccessible depths of the shorter branch this is because it is said to connect (whether spiritually or physically is not specified) to Mount Fuji, a mountain deity itself, on the far shore of Sagami Bay.

 

As in Hearn’s day, there is still a steep climb down (and then even moreso going back up again once you are done), but the stone steps are more evenly set and less polished today, and instead of a ‘plank gallery’ there is now a long wide concrete stilted walkway which comfortably skirts the cliffside, from which you can watch the sea surging over the rock shelf where local fishermen stand stoically while casting their rods, sending their fishing lines out into the surf, or you can descend there yourself to search among the rock pools for a natural rock formation which looks like a turtle swimming out to sea. The entrance to the caves is filled with information panels detailing the history of Enoshima and the caves, as well as the local flora and fauna, and the artworks this place has inspired. Such as a poem by one of Japan’s most well-known poets, Akiko Yosano, which is inscribed upon a rock set in a mirror-like pool near the mouth of the first cave. With an admirable economy of words characteristic of Japanese haikai, this short verse manages to evoke the magical atmosphere of the island’s inward and outward facing vistas.

 

沖つ風　吹けばまたゝく　蝋の灯に

志づく散るなり　江の島の洞

 

Wind from the sea,

The shimmering candle light,

A drop spread, the cave of Enoshima.

 

Akiko Yosano (1912).

 

Further down the passage, the same as when Hearn came here, visitors are still given lighted candles to carry. Clutching these we ventured into the wet, dripping darkness, following in Hearn’s literal footsteps, silently trepidatious and inwardly praying to Benten that the earth might hold off on initiating any tremors or full-scale earthquakes until we were safely outside once more. As the tall ceiling of the cave gradually lowers at its furthest reach, it does feel as though you are peeping into another realm of subterranean enchantment, like Rupert Bear humming a few familiar bars of the Frog Song. The long, dark and dank passage presents a challenge to the senses, especially those that usually manage to hold our fears of nocturnal claustrophobia at bay. There is, however, a leavening sense of light-relief to be found in the adjacent cave, where a Disney-esque dragon statue lurks and can be made to give a (concealed, tannoy-induced) roar if you clap your hands at its far end – a delight for young Rupert Bear-like kids and light-hearted, less fussy folk, rather than for our somewhat grumpy grown-up friend who penned the Rough Guide.

 

Continuing this whimsical quest for Enoshima’s dragon lore associations, at the top of the hill, far above the caves and tastefully set apart from the shrines, there is a so-called ‘Dragon’s Love Bell’ which visitors can ring. It’s a modern ship’s bell made of bronze, clearly installed in very recent times in a metal framework with a sturdy rope attached to its clapper so that it can be rung by couples (predominantly young, but also old alike) as a means of proclaiming their eternal and undying love to all within earshot. An adjacent set of metal railings have been very conveniently erected here to accommodate a new and now seemingly universal copycat-trend of modern-day Romeos and Juliets, who wish to set an immovable padlock to slowly rust at scenic spots (discarding the key) as a sign of their eternal troths having been duly pledged. However, setting up a fully-committed site for this purpose seems a very shrewd move on the part of tourist management strategies for the island, largely so that Enoshima isn’t plagued by the appearance of such padlocks in other parts of the island where they might cause damage to the island’s heritage or become unwanted eyesores. Oddly enough though, for a site of such dedicated personal absorption, this is also the one place on the island where complete strangers are most likely to interact, because despite there being a ‘selfie’ stand provided, more often than not couples seem inclined to offer to take photos for one another, in a kind of cupid-inspired relay of mutual assistance.

 

Everywhere I looked while wandering the paths and precincts of the island’s sacred shrines there seemed to be people taking photographs of their companions or group selfies rather than photos of the buildings and monuments, or more occasionally of the stunning views. It’s been widely reported in the news – this year especially – that, since Japan has re-opened its borders to tourists with the end of the Covid pandemic, the country has begun to suffer the ill effects of ‘over-tourism,’ with traveller’s disregarding ordinary decency as much as an awareness and sensitivity to local customs, or the rights of local people to go about their daily lives undisturbed. Some tourist hotspots here, such as the five lakes district around Mount Fuji, have attempted to discourage the internet-fuelled fever-trend for seeking out famously-framed views from particular locations specifically for the purpose of creating social media posts and ‘influencer content’ (the modern-day digital equivalent of “Kilroy woz ‘ere”) due to the disruption and damage it has increasingly spawned. The herd-like nature of mass tourism is nothing new, but the increasingly locust-like phenomenon of today’s traveller seems to be a new and deeply self-centred trait. Along with the usual flows of Europeans and Americans there certainly seem to be far more Asian tourists here now, particularly from India and China, compared to when I first began visiting Japan – but it’s definitely not a trend restricted to certain demographics or nationalities alone, it’s a symptom of our ever-increasing global mobility. All tourists regardless of culture or creed are equally culpable, and all tourists need to be more culturally aware. A good guest should be grateful, not greedy; discreet rather than rudely disruptive.

海街 diary (Umimachi Diary), also titled Our Little Sister (2015)

 

After all this arduous climbing in a dedicated pilgrim-like adherence to the three main tenets of modern travel (‘Eat, Pray, Love’), those footsore visitors to Enoshima who have prayed devoutly at the shrines and caves, and duly rung the dragon bell and set a padlock declaring their undying love should certainly reward themselves with some well-earned refreshments eaten and relished in one of the many tea shops or restaurants set along the tree-fringed verge of the high clifftops overlooking the sea. ‘Perched upon this verge,’ just as they were in Hearn’s day, with large windows and verandas ‘all widely open to the sea wind, so that, looking through them, over their [tatami] matted floors and lacquered balconies one sees the ocean as in a picture-frame, and the pale clear horizon specked with snowy sails ...’ (p. 90)

 

The foremost regional specialty in these restaurants is undoubtedly shirasu, or white bait. These are the tiny young fry of fish harvested in two limited seasonal periods during the spring and autumn, which are most commonly eaten atop rice bowls (donburi) garnished with various types of seaweed and Japanese basil (shiso), and they are either served raw or boiled, or a combination of the two. Boiled shirasu can also be eaten on toast, as I first encountered them in one of my favourite films, 海街 diary (Umimachi Diary), also titled Our Little Sister (2015), which was filmed only a short distance further along the coast between Enoshima and Kamakura. The name shirasu is said by local fishermen to be echoed in the shape they take when boiled, which uncannily conforms to the hiragana character for shi = し.

 

Naturally, the best and most memorably romantic way to round off a day’s exploration of Enoshima is to watch the magnificent, resplendent orange-blaze of the sun as it sets into the mist shrouded horizon of the sea from the high viewpoint of the island’s cliffs. But finding a spot which isn’t crowded out by the human throng of fellow day-trippers, all straining to take the perfect selfies on their camera-phones, is a challenge. It was here, at this very moment in our own wanderings around the island, that I first began to think about the shifting characteristics of travel in its current, modern-day manifestations. I found myself thinking about the words of Lafcadio Hearn and Joseph Conrad, and of all the information panels we’d encountered and read, as well as the half page of my inch-thick Rough Guide describing Enoshima. I found myself pondering how the experience of travel is both uniquely individual and inescapably generic. There is no one true form of travel writing. What Conrad and others lament the loss of isn’t so much the novelty of discovery, but rather the lost sense of exclusivity.

 

Mass tourism may well have overcrowded the places which we have collectively deemed to be the most interesting or picturesque locations to visit. It is only natural to mourn the fact that at many of these tourist hotspots it’s nigh impossible to savour them in silence and solitude. But we often curate our own experiences, waiting for that gap in the swarming crowd to snap an unpeopled view which in time will end up posted on our social media accounts, rendering a memory which may well with the passage of time mellow into a projection of the place which we have sought to create, that unique idea of a place such as Enoshima, sacred and beautiful, and the charmed experience which perhaps we went there in search of. It’s all a matter of perspective – ‘Twas ever thus! – Travellers have always embellished and distorted the truths found in the places they encountered and the tales they told upon their return. It’s disingenuous to think or claim otherwise, after all, the world is essentially whatever we make of it.

 

In writing this essay, Enoshima has already begun to transform itself in my memory, converting ‘historical facts in a foreign and gorgeous atmosphere’ through the lyrical and picturesque words of other travel writers, poets and the woodblock prints of Ukiyo-e artists to add character and flavour to my own carefully curated photographs and the paragraphs of self-reflective prose which I’ve spent time very carefully crafting above. But who am I? And why should anyone be interested in my meandering tales? – I’m just another travel writer, as Conrad might observe, for whatever it is worth, attempting to distil ‘the spirit of modern travel itself.’ – Another personal perspective on times and places far away, already fading and all too soon to be forgotten.

 

References

Andrei Codrescu, ‘The Many Lives of Lafcadio Hearn,’ The Paris Review (2 July 2019)

Joseph Conrad, Tales of Hearsay and Last Essays (Dent’s Collected Edition, 1955)

Robert D. Foulke, ‘Life in the Dying World of Sail, 1870-1910,’ Journal of British Studies, Vol. 3, No. 1 (November, 1963), pp. 105-136

Lafcadio Hearn, Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, Vol. 1 (Houghton Mifflin, 1895)

Henry Johnson, ‘Enoshima: Signifying Island Heritage Across Space and Place,’ Okinawan Journal of Island Studies, Vol. 3, No. 1 (2022), pp. 3–20

Iwaya Benzaiten, Enoshima, History in Postcards (27 July 2024)

Zoria Petkoska, ‘Island-Inspired Poetry From Around Japan,’ Tokyo Weekender (2 November 2022)

The Rough Guide to Japan (2008)

Shirasu – Trails to Oishii Tokyo (NHK World, Japan: first broadcast 4 May 2022)

海街 diary (Umimachi Diary), also titled Our Little Sister (written & directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda, 2015; based on the manga by Akimi Yoshida, serialised in Shōgakukan’s Monthly Flowers magazine, 2006-2018)

Also on 'Waymarks'

The Buddha at Kamakura - Japan

A Poetic Pilgrimage to Matsushima

Lost Japan - Tradition & Transience

The Dancing Girl of Izu

"My Asakusa" - Sadako Sawamura & Me

The "Isle of Bow" - A Journey of Discovery

Razumov & The Ile Rousseau

Visiting Conrad's Grave - Canterbury

All photographs of Enoshima by Tim Chamberlain, October 2024.

Megaliths of Malta

 

Writing in 1924, the anthropologist, Leonard Dudley Buxton, observed: “The student of human history will find many remarkable things in Malta.” – He’s not wrong. For anyone with an interest in history, Malta is a genuine ‘Treasure Island.’ My first memory of hearing about this remarkable place was from my grandmother. When I was a child, she used to keep a handwritten list pinned by a magnet to the door of her refrigerator. It was a list of all the places she wanted to visit and all the adventurous the things she wanted to do. Once she’d done them, she used to get me to cross them off using a red pencil. Two of the things I remember listed on that piece of paper were a flight on Concorde and a visit to the Island of Malta. My grandmother knew I was very interested in history; hence I remember her showing me photographs of her and my grandfather riding the beautiful old buses (which until relatively recently were still in service on the island), visiting crumbling castles and sun-kissed harbours filled with beautiful sailing boats. Malta certainly did appeal to me. To my young ears there was a lyrical, lilting magic to the sound of its name, like honeycomb and milk chocolate – Malta. It was something I never forgot, and so, several decades later, having just finished my masters degree in history, I decided it was high time to finally see Malta for myself.

 

Old buses at Mdina, Malta

Malta is a small archipelago of five islands. The two main islands are Malta and Gozo, with two smaller islands, Comino and Cominetto, set in the channel between them; plus there is also a small outlying island, Filfla, located off the southwest coast of Malta. It is only a modest archipelago. Malta is about 95 miles square, and Gozo just 25 square miles. Consequently, it is the perfect size to explore during a one or two week holiday. I got myself a bus pass which enabled me to hop on and off the buses which frequently crisscross the island, and this proved to be the best way to navigate from one historical site to another because there are many interesting places to see. Human occupation on the island goes back to at least the Neolithic period when a flourishing culture constructed a series of unique and unusual megalithic ‘buildings’ and subterranean crypts, some of which predate other well known Neolithic sites such as Stonehenge in England. Many centuries later the island was home to the Hospitaller Knights of St. John who were displaced here from the island of Rhodes when Rhodes fell to the Ottomans in 1523. The Knights of St. John are responsible for most of the formidable fortifications which can still be seen in the main town of Valletta. In more recent history the island was known as ‘Fortress Malta’ during World War 2, when it formed an important naval base for the Allied resistance to the invading Nazi military machine in the Mediterranean arena.

 

'Gallarijia' balconies in Valletta

I spent my first day on Malta exploring the old town of Valletta which is a warren of narrow streets filled with fascinating old buildings, gardens, churches and ramparts. It is a picturesque place to wander around, the streets overhung by distinctive ‘gallarijia’ balconies, and plenty of churches to sneak a peek inside as you find them when strolling the back streets. The Co-Cathedral of St. John is well worth a visit with its grandly elaborate Barqoue interior lavishly decked out in gold, marble and bright paint. The Cathedral’s Oratory holds two marvellous paintings by Caravaggio – the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, painted in 1608, is Caravaggio’s largest canvas and also the only one of his works which he signed; plus, a portrait of St. Jerome writing, perhaps showing him translating the Bible from Greek into Latin. It is one of two versions of this subject by him which I particularly like. When Caravaggio was on Malta painting these works the Cathedral would have looked much more austere. Its Baroque decorations were added later over the course of many years.

 

The Co-Cathedral of St. John, Valletta

Beheading of St. John the Baptist, by Caravaggio

Caravaggio arrived here on Malta in July 1607 and became a novice of the Order of St. John. He was a brilliant young firebrand, noted for his prodigious talents in painting and picking fights. Having killed a well-connected man in Rome the year before, he fled Italy and found sanctuary on the island. Soon after his arrival he was involved in yet another brawl, this time with six other Italian knights in which a knight of high rank was shot and seriously wounded. Caravaggio was imprisoned in Fort St. Angelo, but managed a daring escape (perhaps aided by influential friends) in which he scaled the fort’s massive walls using ropes. He then fled once again, this time on a boat bound for Sicily. From here he made his way north to Naples, but his life on the run ended somewhat mysteriously when he died, it is thought from a fever, at the age of 39.

 

Saint Jerome, by Caravaggio

Caravaggio’s effect upon European painting was profound, particularly on Mattia Preti, who later painted the Cathedral’s six-section barrel-vaulted ceiling. Noted for its realism Caravaggio’s style broke with the norms of religious painting, note the absence of chubby little cherubs and winged angels in many of his works. His subjects can often be vividly gruesome, choosing to focus on beheadings and the like, but he is also capable of scenes of great serenity – as his two paintings of St. John and St. Jerome found here in the Cathedral each amply attest. Whilst I was staying on Malta I found an interesting book about Caravaggio’s time on the island, Caravaggio: Art, Knighthood and Malta, by Keith Sciberras and David M. Stone (2006).

 

Judith and Holofernes, by Valentin de Boulogne

Heraclitus, by ?

Malta’s National Museum of Fine Art (which I think has moved premises since I visited in 2014) also houses some really magnificent paintings. Here the works which struck me most were Valentin de Boulogne’s Judith and Holofernes, which shows clear influences of Caravaggio’s treatment of the same gruesome subject, and a very moving painting of an old man weeping, titled Heraclitus – which sadly I failed to note down the name of the artist (and I’ve since been unable to find any reference to it on-line. If anyone knows who it is by, please post a comment to let me know!). There are also two lovely and evocative views of Malta done by the Scottish artist, David Roberts, who is perhaps best know for his distinctive nineteenth-century views of ruined temples and other monuments which he painted whilst on a tour of Egypt.

 

Valletta Harbour, by David Roberts

The 'Sleeping Lady' from the Hypogeum

The National Museum of Archaeology in the centre of Valletta is also well worth a visit before heading out to the various archaeological sites of interest for which Malta is most famous. A large bust of Themistocles ‘Temi’ Zammit, the father of scientific archaeology on Malta and former Director of the Museum, greets you as you arrive. Here artefacts from Malta’s Neolithic Period (5000 BC) up to the Phoenician Period (400 BC), including the ‘Sleeping Lady’ (from the Ħal Saflieni Hypogeum), the ‘Venus of Malta’ (from Ħaġar Qim Temples), Bronze Age daggers (from Tarxien Temples), and a Phoenician anthropomorphic sarcophagus, help to orient you and explain some of the temple sites before you visit. When I visited, perhaps taking its cue from Neil MacGregor, the Museum had put on a special exhibition illustrating the ‘History of Malta in 100 Objects’, including the George Cross Medal which was given to the island’s population as a whole in recognition of Malta’s key role during World War 2.

 

The George Cross Medal presented to the Island of Malta

Since its independence from Britain in 1964 the George Cross insignia has been incorporated into the national flag of Malta, a curious choice when you consider the fact that the George Cross is very much linked to the British Empire from which the island was then seceding, as well as the fact that Malta already has its own long established and very distinctive signature cruciform insignia – the Maltese Cross, which can be found on Maltese 1 Euro coins. I did read somewhere that this choice might have been made because, when the British Empire became the Commonwealth, it was mooted that Malta might be given British dependency status, in much the same way as Jersey and Guernsey, but in the end Malta was made fully independent instead.

 

Għar Dalam, the 'Cave of Darkness'

If you want to begin a tour of subterranean Malta chronologically then the place to start is the cave at Għar Dalam, which means ‘Cave of Darkness’ – although the cave is far less forbidding than its name might suggest, it is actually quite a nice escape from the sun and heat of the day outside. The cave is said to be one of the first places on the island to be inhabited by humans c.5200 BC. These early settlers are thought to have migrated here from Sicily. Malta is only 93 km from Sicily, apparently close enough to be seen on a very clear day. Excavations of the cave floor have yielded all the typical finds indicative of human settlement, such as human and animal remains, rubbish pits, ceramic sherds, etc., as well as much older faunal remains of animals such as hippos, elephants, bears, foxes and wolves. The archaeologists have left a section of the earth in situ to show the stratigraphy of the cave floor, plus several enormous (and still forming) stalactites and stalagmites. Walking the steps to and from the cave there is an interesting defensive contrast between an old watchtower, built by the Knights Hospitaller, and its near neighbour, a concrete ‘pillbox’ built during World War 2.

 

Knights Hospitaller Watchtower and WW2 Pillbox (above)

The main site of subterranean interest on Malta is, of course, the famous Hypogeum (Ħal Saflieni). I remember my grandmother telling me about this – maybe it appealed to her Irish roots, thinking of similar sites such as Newgrange – because Malta’s Hypogeum is a complex underground burial chamber, or a temple to the dead, its layout reminiscent of the nearby Tarxien Temples. Its construction spanning three distinct phases during the long period between c.3600-2500 BC. The site was discovered in 1899 and first investigated by a Jesuit priest, Father Manwel Magri, but unfortunately his notes regarding his exploratory excavations have since been lost, consequently little is known about his early antiquarian investigations. Temi Zammit began a systematic study of the site in 1910, and he estimated that over its 1000 year period of continuous use the site may have held the mortal remains of around 7000 individuals.

 

Temi Zammit

In order not to upset the environmental preservation of the site, particularly in terms of maintaining its levels of humidity, visitor numbers are carefully regulated. Consequently, it is only possible to visit the site as part of a pre-booked tour. When I decided to go to Malta all of these tours were already fully booked, but I’d read that it was possible to buy tickets the day before for one particular day a week, so I decided to chance my luck and see if I could get one of these tickets. The staff at the museum which sold the tickets advised me to get there early on the day the tickets go on sale because there’s always a long queue. They weren’t kidding either. They said I should get there around 8am, so I got there around 7:30am and there were already 12 people in front of me and 6 more arrived straight on my heels! And the queue continued to lengthen while I waited. I’d been told that there were only 20 tickets for sale, hence it was hard not to speculate how many tickets the persons in front of me might be hoping to purchase. I felt sure most of those in front of me would be buying multiple tickets for friends and family who might not have come with them, plus I thought a couple of people near the front looked like local tour guides or perhaps ticket touts. Of course, there was nothing to stop the first person in the queue purchasing the lot outright. But doubts and uncertainties aside, all I could do was to wait and see and hope the gods of old might favour me with a stroke of luck – and favour me they did. When the place opened at 9am, everyone ahead of me watched as shuffling forward we saw those at the front of the queue leaving triumphant with tickets in hand, but there was no way to know how many they’d bought. As I got closer and closer to the ticket counter I could see people were beginning to leave with disappointed faces and empty hands. But it seemed as though the tickets hadn’t run out yet, and it was only when I got to the ticket counter that I discovered why – there was only a single ticket left. Everyone ahead of me was looking for a pair of tickets or multiples of two. For once, somewhat uncharacteristically, the lonesome traveller was at an advantage. I found out the next day when I arrived at the Hypogeum that the chap at the front of the queue had just bought one ticket for himself and this had thrown the whole system and so secured me my precious ticket.

 

Hypogeum (Heritage Malta)

I was really glad to get that ticket too, because the Hypogeum is well worth the visit and it would be a real shame to go to Malta and not see this singular and remarkable prehistoric site. Here’s what I wrote in my travel diary at the time: “The Hypogeum is truly amazing. A short film at the start explains its discovery and excavation. Amazing to think this place was found under what was already quite an urban area – hence who knows what might lie as yet undiscovered beneath our feet elsewhere. The chambers are actually smaller than the photographs of them I’d seen make them appear, but this is mainly because there’s nothing in any of these photos to give an idea of scale. Nevertheless, they are still an astonishing sight. I was most taken by the remnant drill marks in one of the chambers and by the ceilings of two others which are painted with vivid red ochre spirals. Absolutely fascinating. The main chamber and the ‘Holy of Holies’, of course, are stunningly beautiful and fantastically symmetrical. I was struck by one small passing comment on the film commentary – apparently no evidence of soot was found anywhere inside, so how were the subterranean chambers lit during both construction and use?”

 

The Tarxien Temples

From 1915-1919 the nearby Tarxien Temples were also excavated by Temi Zammit. There are four temples here, similarly dating to c.3600-2500 BC, and they must have been utilised by a substantial sized Neolithic community. Once the temples fell out of use the site has evidence of later activity during the Bronze Age and Roman period, as well as during medieval times, after which the site was lost until its rediscovery in the twentieth century. Many important finds have been made here, particularly in terms of monumental sculptures. Spiral motifs can be found here similar to those of the ochre-etched spiral designs on the roof of the Hypogeum. I noted that many of the snail shells I came across on Malta had similar spiral markings decorating their whorled shells, and so I couldn’t help wondering if these motifs might have been inspired from such observations derived from the natural world surrounding these sites.

 

Tarxien is possibly the key site for archaeologists wishing to understand the Neolithic period on Malta, but it is not the most picturesque of Malta’s Neolithic sites. Hence, a visit to Mnajdra and Ħaġar Qim is essential. These two sites are located very close to one another on the coast, far from any modern urban encroachment. The two sites are now each covered by huge sail-like canopies which were built primarily to protect these important sites from the elements, but they also protect the visitor from the full force of the sun too, making it much more pleasant to wander round and explore at leisure. And I don’t think it detracts from an appreciation of the site’s natural setting because after all when the temples were first constructed they would have had their own stone-corbelled rooves, hence you do get some suggestion of them as enclosed spaces.

 

Mnajdra and Ħaġar Qim

The temples consist of a series of rooms with rounded interiors connected by passageways. The walls are made of large upright limestone blocks, and some areas are still paved. There are niches, benches and ‘altars.’ Several of these yellow limestone megalithic slabs are stippled with a pecked honeycomb-like decoration. And some of the stones might have been configured to certain celestial alignments, although many of these assertions have yet to be definitively explained or actually demonstrated. A lot of prehistoric archaeology is speculative due to the nature of there being no written records to help explain or corroborate the design and original function of such sites and how these factors changed, evolved or were adapted over time. Systems of knowledge at this time are largely a mystery to us as modern interpreters, all we have to work with are the sites themselves and the material finds discovered within them – such as fragments of pottery, sculptures, remnants of food and fire use, tools, etc. But looking at the spatiality of such sites and speculating as to how they related to the surrounding landscape as it may have been at the time of construction, as well as factors relating to the climate, possible population densities, and the like are all things to consider and ponder about. A very interesting paper on these elements by David Turnbull which appeared in the academic journal, Theory, Culture & Society, in 2002, titled: Performance and Narrative, Bodies and Movement in the Construction of Places and Objects, Spaces and Knowledges: The Case of the Maltese Megaliths is well worth a read in this regard.

 

Mnajdra and Ħaġar Qim

Further along the coast heading west, the Dingli Cliffs are a lovely spot to walk and see the sunset. Turning inland, however, there is another site of subterranean interest in the town of Rabat – St. Paul’s catacombs. These are the largest and said to be the most impressive of all Malta’s catacombs. Covering an area of over 2000m² the catacombs date back to the Phoenician period at the earliest, and to the period of Arab rule around 870 AD at the latest, but the heyday of the catacombs was during the Byzantine or Romano-Christian period, 4^th-8^th century AD. A flight of stone steps takes you down into a wide atrium-like area where you can see two large round ‘agape tables’ carved into the rock, these were designed and used for leaving food offerings to the dead. From this atrium a labyrinth of low and narrow passageways on multiple levels contain many different designs of tombs which have all been cut into the rock. Some of these types are named as follows: ‘loculus’, recessed graves or niches cut into the walls; ‘forma’, or graves cut into the floor; as well as arched recess graves, known as ‘arcosolium’; and ‘window graves’, which are more like small rooms; plus ‘table’ and ‘bench’ graves, which look like stone chests; and the more elaborate ‘baldacchino’ or canopied graves, which look like the stone tombs found in churches, except these are all carved from the natural rock of the catacomb. The whole place is rather reminiscent of the catacombs seen beneath the church in Venice in the film, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade; and like Indy, you can wander around in the almost pitch darkness exploring this sepulchral space – although here the graves are now empty of their ancient bones. When I went down into the catacomb there were hardly any other visitors, and so I wandered at leisure for quite a long time, exploring the length and breadth of the place – never quite sure of how far it would go or if I’d lose my way and not know how to get back to the entrance. But as I wandered, crossing and recrossing my own path, I began to forma a mental picture of the layout in my mind until I felt fairly confident I knew where I was and where certain passages would lead me. It was also a wonderful escape from the intense heat and the bright sunshine of the day outside.

 

St. Paul's Catacombs

Chronologically, the last or most recent of subterranean sites of interest on Malta are the Lascaris War Rooms back in Valletta. These reminded me a little of the Cabinet War Rooms in London which I last visited when I was a child. The Lascaris War Rooms were built to serve a similar purpose too. This was the place where General Eisenhower oversaw the operations of the Allied Forces based in the Mediterranean during the latter part of World War 2, including the invasion of Sicily (which I think my grandfather might have been a part of; he certainly served in Italy later on). A forlorn and somewhat moth-eaten crowd of manikins populate the old bunk room dormitories, the map rooms and radio stations here, lending the place a spooky and surreal aspect as though it were designed to bemuse and befuddle John Steed in an episode of 1960s TV drama, The Avengers. The underground HQ was known to the troops it housed as ‘The Hole’, but it was really named after the knight, Jean Paul de Lascaris Castellar, because the tunnels were originally dug by the knights as living quarters for their galley slaves. After the War these rather dank and musty old tunnels were extended even further, although the works were abandoned before they were completed with much of the excavation equipment simply left behind, hence no one now really knows what the intended purpose for this was, but, had it been finished, it would have been a huge military warren hidden beneath the ancient streets far above.

 

Lascaris War Rooms

Malta is certainly steeped in history. It’s hard to set foot anywhere on Malta without some historical feature from the near or remote past catching your eye. And for the solo traveller it is a wonderfully accessible and easily navigable place to get around. I managed to fill a week with plenty of historical sites, churches and museums – and there were still places I didn’t manage to get to see on Malta, let alone Gozo. It’s definitely a place which I can’t imagine I’d ever get bored of exploring. I’d long wanted to come here, and so, sitting at the airport, waiting to board my flight home, I reflected on the fact that I could now draw a red pencil line through it on my own personal wish list of places to see and visit in my lifetime. It is a place which will linger long in my memory. Maybe one day I will return, but for now – for this history buff, it was the perfect place to have celebrated the personal milestone of achieving my MA in history.

 

 

See more photographs from my trip to Malta here

 

 

References

L. H. Dudley Buxton, Malta: An Anthropogeographical Study, in Geographical Review, Vol. 14, No. 1 (January, 1924), pp. 75-87

Keith Sciberras & David M. Stone, Caravaggio: Art, Knighthood, and Malta (Valetta, Malta: Midsea Books Ltd., 2006)

David Turnbull, Performance and Narrative, Bodies and Movement in the Construction of Places and Objects, Spaces and Knowledges: The Case of the Maltese Megaliths, in Theory, Culture & Society, Vol. 19, No. 5/6 (2002), pp. 125-143

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