GEOGRAPHIC EXPRESSION OF BUDDHIST PILGRIM PLACES ON SHIKOKU ISLAND,JAPAN*

A variety of places, functioning diversely in human existence, manifest a certain distinctiveness. The distinctiveness is nowhere as explicit and as clearly expressed, perhaps, as it is in “religious places.’ Of these places, holy places of pilgrimage have been of particular attraction to geographers.¹ There is wide variation in the nature of pilgrimage as defined within the canonical structure of each religion; yet it would seem that all pilgrimages are fundamentally place-bound institutions having specific physical locations. A pilgrimage incorporates certain practices, and requires a specific setting, thus giving rise to distinct geographic and behavioural forms.