Japan: 'Susanoo Slaying the Yamata-no-Orochi', triptych by Toyohara Chikanobu (1838-1912), c. 1870s

Susanoo-no-Mikoto, more commonly known as just Susanoo or Susano-o, was a kami and god in the Shinto pantheon, master of storm and sea. He was born, alongside his siblings Amaterasu and Tsukuyomi, when the creator god Izanagi washed himself after his journey into the Yomi, the underworld. Susano was born from Izanagi washing his nose.

Susanoo was known as a hot-headed and violent man, and had a long-standing rivalry with his sister Amaterasu. After losing a chalenge to her, he raged and killed one of her attendants, destroyed her rice fields and hurled a flayed pony at her loom. For these actions, he was banished from Heaven.

Descending to the province of Izumo, he aided an elderly couple whose children had been devoured by the eight-headed dragon Yamato-no-Orochi. Saving their eighth daughter by turning her into a comb, and later marrying her, he fooled Orochi by setting out eight bowls of sake for it to drink and waiting till the dragon was drunk and asleep. He then cut off the dragon's heads, and retrieved a great sword from Orochi's tail, which he gifted to Amaterasu as a reconciliation gift.

Susanoo is enshrined at Kumano Taisha, in Shimane (formerly Izumo), and is still worshipped by Shintoists to this day.

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