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Utagawa Kunisada (歌川国貞; b. 1786, d. 1865)  · Public domain  · a work of art, not a likeness

Tradition collection 1,007 records

East Asian traditions

Daoism, Confucian practice, Chinese folk religion, Shinto and Korean tradition.

  • Extent China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam and the diaspora, roughly 1200 BCE to the present.
  • Holds 436 places · 420 gods · 83 traditions · 57 figures
See the holy places

Before you count

Whether a given practice is 'a religion' is a live argument in this group, and this site does not settle it.

What else it is missing

Places · 436

Holy places and sites

Temples, tombs, holy cities and sites recorded in this collection, the most widely linked first. A place is not a count of believers.

All 436 places

436 places 436 with a point on the map 244 with a date

See them on the atlas

The oldest on record

The earliest recorded starts among its best-known places, by 1000 CE, in date order. Each date is the place’s own — a city’s founding, a building’s — not the start of this tradition there.

  1. 4 BCE Ise Jingū
  2. c. 1st century CE Kotohira-gū
  3. 5th century CE Kumano Nachi Taisha
  4. 478 CE Temple of Confucius, Qufu
  5. 491 CE Xuankong Temple
  6. 593 CE Itsukushima Shrine
  7. 7th century CE Kimpusen-ji Temple
  8. 656 CE Yasaka Shrine

Where they gather

Cities and sites with two or more of its places recorded in them — counted from each place’s own location.

Gods · 420

The gods, and the company they keep

The most widely linked across Wikipedia, this collection’s own first. A picture of a god is a work of art, never a likeness.

All 420 gods

More of its best-linked gods

In company

Pantheons, read from the members’ own records — never from a fixed roster.

Eight Immortals 8 members on record Explore the pantheon

5 more pantheons

Traditions · 83

Many paths, shared histories

The traditions, schools and movements this collection holds — each with its own page.

All 83 traditions

Figures · 57

Who to meet first

The figures its own texts, stories and traditions name — the most widely linked first, this collection’s own before those it shares.

All 57 figures

More of its best-linked figures

Texts and stories · 15

Stories and texts

What was told, and what was written — dated when it was written.

All 8 stories All 7 texts

Institutions, offices and houses · 420

Institutions, offices and houses

Recorded in this collection, the most widely linked first. An office is a line of holders, not a family. A ruling house’s affiliation is the family’s, not its subjects’ practice.

All 411 institutions 1 office

Festivals and practices · 12

Festivals, holy days and practices

Holy days with the day their record gives, then rites and practices. A festival recurs, so it has no date on the historical clock.

All 12 practices

1 more — the full list.

Festivals, practices and events follow how densely Wikidata records them, not how much a tradition keeps: 77% of the 845 held across the collections are Christian, and this collection holds 13.

Also here · 1

Also in this collection

Kinds it holds only one or two of, each with its own page.

What this collection holds

Counted, not scored. Each count opens its list.

Every collection

A record can be more than one kind — a monastery is a place and an institution — so these counts add up to more than its 1,007 records. The sections above count the same way, and draw each record once, under the kind its own page is filed under.

Statements
3,597
With references
384
Undated
690
Accounts
0
Reviewed here
0
What it is missing, and how it was assembled

What this collection is missing

Written by an editor, not computed. A count of records cannot say any of this, and a collection read without it is a collection read wrongly.

  • Whether a given practice is 'a religion' is a live argument in this group, and this site does not settle it.
  • Local shrine deities in Japan and China number in the tens of thousands; a few hundred are recorded.
  • Daoist canon dating is compiled and re-compiled, so a text's date is the edition's more often than the composition's.

Counted across the collections

Festivals, practices and events follow how densely Wikidata records them, not how much a tradition keeps: 77% of the 845 held across the collections are Christian, and this collection holds 13.

What the counts mean

Statements
Relationships and facts recorded on these records.
With references
Statements that cite a source outside Wikimedia.
Undated
Records with no date on any of the three clocks.
Accounts
Named versions of a story, kept apart.
Reviewed here
Read by a person and signed with a date.

How it was assembled

Discovered from Wikidata by class and by religion, ranked by incoming links, then filtered against each item’s own claims. Relationships are imported statements unless a row says otherwise; none of them has been read here.

“Reviewed” means a person read it and signed it with a date — which is why it is zero. Nothing here measures how good the material is.

Records here have an article in 16 languages between them. The interface is English only for now. Published 2026-09-25.

How 26 of these records were placed here through another record

Most records are in East Asian traditions by their own statements. These are here because of another record they are linked to — worked out when the data was built, not stated on the record itself. Each one’s own page says the same.

Cities and sites, through the places recorded in them · 4

  • Nara — 6 of the 23 places recorded in it here are in this collection
  • Nikkō-shi — 3 of the 6 places recorded in it here are in this collection
  • Ise — 4 of the 5 places recorded in it here are in this collection
  • Tenri — 2 of the 3 places recorded in it here are in this collection

Places, through the god they are dedicated to · 8

and 2 more

Parts, through the whole they belong to · 5

Works, through their main subject · 5

Pantheons, through their own published gods · 4

Tokuzo in Edomura · CC BY-SA 4.0

Keep going

Walk East Asian traditions another way.

A family tree as the accounts give it, every mapped place on the atlas, and the dates on the timeline — each on its own clock.

Amaterasu’s family tree On the atlas The timeline, from Confucius