Located at the foot of Mr. Ikoma and listed in the Engishiki, an ancient book of government statutes, this historic shrine was the highest ranked shrine in the Kawachi-no-Kuni province (modern-day eastern Osaka prefecture). They say the shrine was founded before the first emperor of Japan took the throne. Hiraoka is also known as "Moto-Kasuga" because its deities were divided for enshrinement in Nara's Kasuga Taisha Grand Shrine. Said to have originally been built by Hideyori Toyotomi, the current main building is a reconstruction built in 1826. At the shrine's autumn festival, Shugo-sai, known as one of the greatest festivals in Osaka, visitors can see soul-stirring, gorgeous processions of taiko-dai (floats mounted with taiko drums) and danjiri floats. Every year on December 23rd, the shrine holds Owarai Shinji (Ritual of Laughter) to mark the changing of the shrine's Shinto shime-nawa ropes. At the beginning of the year, the shrine holds another holy ritual in which sweet red bean rice porridge is used to predict the success of that year's harvest. With a number of ancient trees on the shrine grounds, the Ministry of the Environment has designated Hiraoka Shrine as one of the "100 landscapes featuring scents." Every spring, some 400 plum trees of around 30 different varieties bloom on the south side of the shrine.