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🏮 Yaya Matsuri

やや祭り

Shonai, Yamagata (Hachiman Shrine) · Every year on the Sunday closest to 15 January

Traditional performing arts

The Yaya Festival is a naked festival held at Yawata Shrine in the Chigawara district of Shonai, Yamagata Prefecture. It is a toshikoshi festival held on the Sunday closest to January 15, in which local boys, bare-chested and wearing a straw waist wrap called a kendai, take part in the ritual in the bitter cold. The festival's origin dates back to the legend of Oyamamori no Mikoto, a prince of Emperor Ojin, who fled to Chigawara after being caught up in a rebellion. Sheltered by a pregnant woman, Oyamamori no Mikoto prayed for safe childbirth and the prosperity of descendants as a token of gratitude, and Yawata Shrine became the shrine overseeing these matters. The purification and hundred-fold pilgrimage once performed by young men was revived after the war in a form centered on boys. The highlight is the purification performed by boys aged 5 to 15. On the stage, a boy stands still with both hands raised, and adults in white robes pour water from a bucket over his shoulders; applause is given as he endures desperately even as snow falls. Afterwards, high school students perform a hundred-fold pilgrimage, going back and forth between the main hall and the torii gate, praying for the prosperity of descendants.