Izumo Ōyashiro Grand Festival

出雲大社大祭礼

Three days built around the annual grand rite, the most important ceremony of Izumo Ōyashiro. At the rite on the 14th an envoy of the Emperor attends and presents the imperial offerings; afterwards a rice-planting dance is offered and mounted archery is held along the approach. On the 15th the people of Taisha town carry out their mikoshi, and the 16th brings the third day’s rite. Through the festival there are sacred kagura dances and great tea gatherings, and the precincts are crowded with worshippers. 14 to 16 May every year.

14–16 May 2027

ExpectedWorked out from past dates. We update it once the organiser announces the dates.

191 days away

Every year, 14 May, for 3 days

Future dates: 14 May 2027 · 14 May 2028 · 14 May 2029

Origin

Izumo Ōyashiro enshrines Ōkuninushi, the god who “made the land”. The great festival that is now the annual rite was once called the Sangatsu-e, the Third-Month Assembly, and was held over three days from the first to the third of the third lunar month. It was praised as “the finest festival of the San’in, the foremost rite of the province”, and for that reason the annual rite is still served as the most important ceremony of the shrine.

What to look for

The grand rite on the 14th. The priests, led by the hereditary chief priest, the Kokusō, walk to the main sanctuary in formal robes worn on this day alone; at a solemn call of warning its doors are opened, and offerings from sea, river, mountain and field are set before the god. Then the imperial envoy comes forward with a chest holding the Emperor’s offerings, which are laid before Ōkuninushi, and reads the imperial prayer. Before the rite, in the Matoi-sai, priests shoot arrows along the pine-lined approach to drive out evil; after it comes a rice-planting dance and spirited mounted archery on the approach. In the mikoshi procession on the 15th the parishioners of Taisha town carry their mikoshi through the streets with a procession of children, to flutes and drums. Throughout the festival Izumo kagura is performed in front of the Kagura-den.

How to watch

The way to worship at Izumo Ōyashiro is to bow twice, clap four times and bow once. Only at the grand rite of 14 May are eight claps made: eight has long stood for the limitless, so eight claps praise the god without limit, and the everyday four claps are half of that. The third day’s rite on the 16th, the Izumo Yashiki Kansha Taisai, is attended by people who had their land purified by the shrine’s Izumo Yashiki ground-blessing, for example when building a house, and after the rite they receive purifying sand from before the god.

If you go

On the 14th, the Matoi-sai is at 9 a.m. and the grand rite at 10; on the 15th the mikoshi procession sets out at noon. The rice-planting dance and mounted archery follow the grand rite. There is an eve-of-festival rite on the night of the 13th, and great tea gatherings on the 15th and 16th. Izumo Ōyashiro is about 25 minutes by Ichibata bus from JR Izumoshi Station, and the shrine has car parks around the precincts (385 spaces in the largest).

Where

Izumo Ōyashiro

Izumo, Shimane

Open in maps

Sources

← All festivals