祇園

Japan's most famous geisha district is named — via a shrine and 1,500 years of borrowing — after Jetavana, a monastery in ancient India where the Buddha taught. The famous opening line of the Tale of the Heike rings the same bell.

Gion traces to Jetavana — the monastery grove in ancient India where the Buddha taught. Its guardian deity was enshrined here at Gion-sha (renamed Yasaka Shrine in 1868), and the temple town that grew at its gates took the name. Japan's most famous geisha district is, etymologically, an Indian monastery.

The district grew as the temple town at the shrine's gates. The opening line of the Tale of the Heike — 'the bell of Gion Shōja' — rings the very same Indian monastery.