Who Is Yamata no Orochi (Eight-headed serpent)?
The giant serpent with eight heads and eight tails
Yamata-no-Orochi
Yamata no Orochi is a giant serpent monster in the Kojiki with eight heads and eight tails. Its eyes were red like winter cherries, moss and cypress and cedar trees grew on its body, and it was said to be so long that it stretched across eight valleys and eight hills.
Coming from Koshi every year, it ate one daughter of the old couple Ashinazuchi and Tenazuchi at a time, and seven had already been eaten. It came for the last one, Kushinadahime, but Susanoo had eight gates prepared. The serpent put its eight heads through the gates, drank up the extremely strong sake called Yashiori, and passed out drunk. Susanoo cut it down as it slept, and the Hi River ran red with its blood. When he cut the middle tail, a great sword came out; this became the Kusanagi sword (Kusanagi-no-Tachi).
One theory says the Orochi represents the Hii River in Izumo, which often flooded.
