Mount Funaoka is only 111.7 meters tall, but few hills in Japan carry as much history. The 10th-century court lady Sei Shonagon named it in chapter 231 of The Pillow Book as the first hill that came to mind for a Kyoto aristocrat. The monk Yoshida Kenko mentioned it in his Tsurezuregusa as a burial ground for the ancient capital. Some scholars believe the hill served as a surveying reference point for the north-south axis when Heian-kyo was laid out, sitting directly north of Suzaku-oji, the city's central avenue. Another theory holds that it was worshipped as a sacred mountain even before Kyoto existed, its rocky summit corresponding to Genbu, the Black Tortoise, one of four cardinal gods protecting the city according to Chinese geomancy. Neither theory has been proven, but both speak to the hill's gravitational pull on the Japanese imagination.

The hill's darker chapters run deep. In 1156, after the Hogen Rebellion, the defeated Minamoto no Tameyoshi and his children were executed on its slopes. Three centuries later, during the Onin War of 1467, two provincial governors built Funaokayama Castle on the summit and barricaded themselves inside as part of the Western Army. The surrounding neighborhood still carries the name Nishijin, meaning "western camp," a living echo of that siege. After Nobunaga's death in 1582, Toyotomi Hideyoshi obtained permission from Emperor Ogimachi to build a temple and mausoleum for his fallen lord on this very hill. But the plan was sabotaged by the rival Ishida Mitsunari, and the mausoleum was never constructed. Still, throughout the entire Edo period, Mount Funaoka was regarded as sacred ground connected to Nobunaga's spirit, as though the hill itself had been waiting for the shrine that would eventually come.

Emperor Meiji's 1869 decree set in motion a shrine that would travel before finding its permanent home. The first structure was built on October 17, 1870, at the Tokyo residence of Oda Nobutoshi, a descendant of Nobunaga and former daimyo of Tendo Domain. A companion shrine was erected in the city of Tendo, Yamagata. In 1875, the shrine received an official rank under the State Shinto system. Then in September 1880, it was relocated from Tokyo to the foot of Mount Funaoka in Kyoto, and finally moved uphill to its current mountaintop position in 1910. Today the shrine enshrines both Nobunaga and his son Oda Nobutada as a secondary deity. The grounds offer sweeping views of Mount Daimonji and Mount Hiei, and the approach is marked by the largest unpainted torii gate in all of Kyoto Prefecture.

Kenkun Shrine has become a destination for enthusiasts of Japanese swords and martial culture. The shrine houses artifacts connected to Nobunaga, including charms associated with swords said to have been among his favorites. Each year the Funaoka Matsuri festival on October 19th draws crowds for its reenactment of Nobunaga's triumphal entry into Kyoto. The festival features a performance of the Noh dance Atsumori, which was reportedly a favorite of Nobunaga himself, alongside bugaku court dance and demonstrations of period weaponry, including matchlock rifle displays by men in Sengoku-era armor. The festival transforms the quiet hilltop shrine into a vivid window onto the turbulent 16th century, when a single warlord's ambition reshaped the entire nation.

The area around the shrine has been developed into Funaokayama Park, Kyoto's first urban park, though the land is technically leased by the city from the Zen temple Daitoku-ji. The park remains one of northern Kyoto's quieter corners, overlooked by tourists streaming toward the more famous temples to the south. From the shrine grounds on clear days, the view stretches across the city's rooftops to the distinctive character burned into Mount Daimonji during the annual Gozan no Okuribi festival. It is a vantage point that Nobunaga himself never enjoyed, but one that Emperor Meiji chose deliberately, placing the warlord's spirit where it could watch over the capital he once conquered.