Chichibu Kawase Matsuri

The Chichibu Kawase Matsuri is the summer festival of Chichibu Shrine, known locally as "Ogion". It is often described as the counterpart to the famous winter Chichibu Yomatsuri: a daytime festival rather than a night one, a summer event rather than a winter one, and, above all, a festival for children rather than adults. Youngsters take many of the central roles, serving as the "hayashite" musicians aboard the kasaboko and yatai floats and as the "hyoshigi" clapper-players wearing flower hats, which gives the whole event a distinctive charm.

Origins and history

The Kawase Matsuri descends from the Gion festivals that flourished in the Heian period, spreading to the Chichibu region as Gion belief took hold. Its exact founding date is unknown, but references to the festival appear in documents dating back as far as 1659 and 1707 (Hoei 4), as well as the Bunka–Tenpo era (1804–1844). It was originally held on the fifteenth day of the sixth month under the old lunar calendar, and moved to its present dates of 19 and 20 July following the calendar reform of the Meiji period.

The eve festival (19 July)

From the afternoon of the 19th, eight ornately decorated floats, four kasaboko and four yatai, are pulled through the streets of central Chichibu to the rousing sound of the Chichibu yatai-bayashi music. As evening falls, the floats converge on Chichibu Shrine. There, a rite called the "Tenno Hashiradate" welcomes Susanoo-no-Mikoto.

Late that night, the festival's connection to water comes to the fore. Young people from each district draw water from the clear Arakawa River and carry it back to purify their neighbourhoods, a rite known as "Omizutori" that precedes the following day's mikoshi washing.

The main festival (20 July)

The main day opens with morning ceremonies, after which the sacred procession sets out in the early afternoon. The eight floats are joined by the shrine's mikoshi, a white-wood portable shrine weighing around 400 kilograms and carried by thirty-four young men chosen from the districts, and the procession moves from the shrine down to the riverside ceremonial ground on the Arakawa.

There, the festival reaches its climax with the mikoshi washing, in which the portable shrine is borne into the clear river current — the rite from which the festival takes its name, believed to wash away misfortune of every kind. After offerings such as kagura dance, the mikoshi returns to the shrine. The floats continue to be pulled through the districts into the night, with the passing manoeuvres ("surechigai") and the final parting of the floats ("hikiwakare") among the highlights before the festival draws to a close.

A pair with the winter festival

At Chichibu Shrine, the mikoshi makes its procession only twice a year: at the Kawase Matsuri in summer and at the Chichibu Night Festival (Yomatsuri) in winter. The two are often seen as a matched pair. The summer festival centres on children and descends from the shrine to the river, while the winter festival centres on adults and climbs from the shrine towards the mountain — a symmetry of season that is mirrored, some would say, in the rituals themselves.