SUSANOO

SUSANOO: God of the Ocean.

Being born from the snot of IZANAGI was not an auspicious start to life and could be the reason SUSANOO was prone to behaving like a bit of a bogey — especially towards his sister AMATERASU. She was born from the left eye of IZANAGI presumably after wiping a tear away after sneezing. He had just come back from the Underworld and was covered in gloom dust. Another God, TSUKIYOMI, was born from a tear in his right eye.

AMATERASU was given the sun and TSUKIYOMI was given the moon and SUSANOO was given the ocean, which he rejected.

He then argued with his sister saying the one that could produce the most godlets instantly should have the most power. He snatched her fertility beads, bit them open and spat out five godlings, shouting 'I've won. AMATERASU counter claimed saying as the beads belonged to her so did the godlets. This caused SUSANOO to have endless tantrums, rushing about the world and throwing things all over the place. He ended up by throwing a flayed horse through the roof of AMATERASU's Sewing Room which scared the daylights out of her so she ran away and hid in a cave which caused no end of commotion as the sun couldn't shine again until she was coaxed out.

SUSANOO was then thrown out of heaven and mooched about earth rather at a loss until he met an old couple weeping copiously. 'What's up?' he asked, and they told him they were due to be visited by an eight-headed dragon. He had already eaten seven of their daughters and now he was coming to scoff the very last one. When SUSANOO saw the daughter he realized what was missing in his life, and said 'Give your daughter to me — I'll look after her don't you worry — now tell me about this dragon and have you got any booze?'.

SUSANOO changed the girl into a comb, as he still retained some godly powers, and stuck her into his hair to keep her out of harm's way and then filled eight bowls with rice wine inside a palisade he built which had eight holes in it. The dragon came sniffing along its usual route, came across the neatly concealed wine and thought this is my day. Eight heads popped through the holes, eight tongues lapped, eight brains became befuddled and the whole dragon conurbation fell into a slumber. Enter SUSANOO with a sword, and a swish, and a lop and a chop, chop, chop, chop, chop, chop, chop. Just for good measure he gave a few extra strokes to the body and something dropped out of the dragon's tail with a clung it turned out to be a sword.

The sword is called KUSANAGI and supplies proof to all you skeptics that this tale must be absolutely true as this is the Imperial Sword of the Japanese Royal Family and may be viewed today providing you can get the necessary permission.

And SUSANOO? From then on he always kept his nose clean.