Located in Jinryo, Ōtsu City, Shiga Prefecture, Takebe Taisha is the Ichinomiya of the former Ōmi Province, enshrining the legendary hero Yamato Takeru no Mikoto. Tradition holds that the shrine was founded in the 46th year of Emperor Keikō (116 CE) when Yamato Takeru's consort Futajihime no Mikoto enshrined his spirit in the Takebe district of Kanzaki County (present-day Higashiōmi area), and that it was relocated to its current site in 675 (Tenmu 4).

In 675 (Tenmu 4), the shrine was relocated from its original site in the Takebe district of Kanzaki County to its present location at Seta. This is considered part of Emperor Tenmu's reorganization of national rites and marked the establishment of Takebe Taisha as the Ichinomiya of Ōmi Province. Seta had been a strategic point on the Tōkaidō and Tōsandō highways since antiquity, lending great significance to the shrine's position as a center of national worship.

During the Sengoku period, Toyotomi Hideyoshi protected Takebe Taisha and guaranteed its shrine lands as a way of asserting the legitimacy of his rule over Omi Province. The shrine, revered since ancient times as Omi Province's ichinomiya (chief shrine) and a deity of martial fortune and career success, had likewise been protected by Oda Nobunaga.