- Hōnen Matsuri
nihongo|Hōnen Matsuri|豊年祭| (Japanese for "Harvest Festival") is a fertility
festival celebrated every year onMarch 15 inJapan . The most well-known of these festivals takes place in the town ofKomaki , just north ofNagoya City . "Hōnen" means "richharvest " in Japanese, while amatsuri is a festival or holiday. The Hōnen festival and ceremony celebrate the blessings of a bountiful harvest and all manner of prosperity and fertility.The festival's main features of interest are
Shinto priests playing musical instruments, a parade of ceremonially-garbed participants, all-you-can-drink sake, and a 280 kg (620 pound), 2.5 meter (96 inch)-longwood enphallus . The wooden phallus is carried from a shrine called "Shinmei Sha" (in even-numbered years) on a large hill or from Kumano-sha Shrine (in odd-numbered years), to a shrine called "Tagata Jinja".The festival starts with celebration and preparation at 10 a.m. at "Tagata Jinja", where all sorts of foods and souvenirs (mostly phallus-shaped or related) are sold. "
Sake " is also passed out freely from large wooden barrels. At about 2pm everyone gathers at "Shinmei Sha" for the start of the procession.Shinto priests say prayers and make blessings on the participants and "mikoshi " which are to be carried along the parade route, as well as the large woodenphallus .When the procession makes its way down to "Tagata Jinja" the phallus in its "
mikoshi " is spun furiously before it is set down and more prayers are said. Everyone then gathers in the square outside "Tagata Jinja" and waits for the "mochi nage", at which time the crowd is showered with small rice cakes which are thrown down by the officials from raised platforms. The festival concludes at about 4:30 p.m.References
* [http://photoguide.jp/pix/thumbnails.php?album=529 Tagata Shrine Honen Festival 田縣神社 豊年祭] (contains photos showing many of the events described above)
External links
* [http://www.yamasa.org/japan/english/destinations/aichi/tagata_jinja.html Yamasa Institute Tagata Jinja - Hounen Matsuri site (English)]
*http://farstrider.net/Japan/Festivals/HounenMatsuri/
* [http://www.thoeny.com/peter/tagata/tagata1.html Phallus photos and bits of info]
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