Aoi Matsuri
(Hollyhock Festival)

May 15th (fixed)

Saio-dai

Aoi-matsuri is one of the three biggest festivals in Kyoto with Gion Matsuri and Jidai Matsuri..
The procession through the city is solemn, graceful and moving very slowly.

The reason this festival is called Hollyhock Festival is that all the participants of the procession,
even horses or cattle, decorate their costume with leaves of hollyhock.
This kind of hollyhock used in this festival is formaly named futaba-aoi which have small
red-purple lovely flowers and grow naturally in the cedar forest
or on the edge of the clean river in the mountainside.
Participants have been decorated themselves with hollyhock leaves since 807 (Dido 2)
People had been believed that hollyhock have special power such as protection
against lightning and earthquakes, and guaranteeing to have easy birth.
They prepare approximatery 10,000 hollyhocks for this festival.
More than 400 people dresses in period costumes
with hollyhock leaves make procession.
There we can see beautifully decorated ox-drawn carriages calld Gissha.
They are vehicles for high status people like a messenger of the Emperor or Saioh-dai.


*****

It is said that this festival started during the end of the Kofun period.
During the administration of the Emperor Kinmei (540 - 571),
they often had bad weather such as typhoons, and they had been unable to get harvest..
People were suffering with hunger and plague.
The Emperor Kinmei orderd a soothsayer to divine what was happening and what to do.
Then he had discovered that the gods of Kamo Shrine were furious with rage at impieties of the people
and had been punished them.
So, the Emperor decided to send his imperial messengers to Shimogamo Shrine and Kamigamo Shrine
and present offerings to the gods, and held a festival.
This festival abated the god's fury and it has continued in commemoration of these event since then..

So, this festival had been managed by the Emperors.
Originaly the purpose of this festival is to read the Emperor's Shinto ritual prayer and
to present the offering from the Emperor, which are performed by the imperial messengers.
The Emperors had used to observe the dances for starting and checked the decorated horses.
Today, offering of gosaimon (the address of the gods) by the imperial messengers and dancings, etc.
are performed in front of the gods in shimogamo Shrine and Kamigamo Shrine..

* The times show when the procession will pass.
* It takes approximatery 1 hour to pass the procession.

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