NIPPON Kichi - 日本吉

2007/7/31

南部の火祭り Nanbu-no-hi-matsuri Fire Festival of Nanbu

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Fire Festival of Nanbu is a folk event held in Nanbu Town on the Fuji River in Yamanashi Prefecture. The history of the festival began in the middle of the Edo period (1603-1868) as a Bon event to see off for the souls and also to pray for the protection of the rice fields from insects, a form of seeing off the beetles, mushi okuri. It had been discontinued for a long time but was restarted in 1988. It is a representative summer event in the area along the Fuji River.

The festival is composed of four events; throwing torches, lantern offerings, 108 pine torches and Grand pine torch. The festival starts with the event of throwing torches, in which people toss burning torches into a straw beehive bound to a pole with a length of more than ten meters. In the event od Grand pine torch, blazes of the burning huge torch and the voices of priests reading mantra lead the spaectators to the world of fantasy. At 8:00 OM, 108 pine torches representing 108 illusions (bonno) of the human mind are lit up all at once, which creates a magnificent scenry. It looks as if the river is ablaze. It gives so deep an impression that spectators will never forget the exquisite scenry of this fire festival.

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address
Nanbu, Nanbu-cho, Minamikoma-gun, Yamanashi Prefecture 409-2212
name
Fire Festival of Nanbu




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