ENGI SHIKI

   The Engi-shiki, Procedures (or Institutes) of the Engi Era (901-923) was a 50-volume ritsuryo text which included legal and administrative procedures and the ritual and ceremonial calendar of the imperial court (e.g. the procedures for the institution of the saigu). It was completed in 927 and promulgated forty years later. The Engishiki preserves the text of 27 ancient norito or ritual prayers used in court ceremonial and it refers to 3,132 officially recognised shrines, later proudly referred to as shiki-nai-sha. The Engi-shiki ritual calendar (see Nenchu gyoji) was followed in reduced form in the Tokugawa era and replaced in the Meiji period by a different framework of thirteen imperial rites celebrated as national Shinto holidays.