A few weeks ago, I wrote about the delivery of the sacred timber to Isë Jingū (伊勢神宮). However, the July 21st issue of Jinja Shinpō (神社新報) devoted its entire back page to more details of what happened along the way, so I am going to write about it again. There were a lot of matsuri involved.
The earlier article covered what happened in Nagano, the starting point for one set of timber. That truck then made its way through Aichi Prefecture, where there were fourteen events and ceremonies along the route. The first event took place on 6th June at a carpark attached to a bypass. Which sounds terribly glamorous. The trees were transferred to decorated wagons, and then pulled by local residents. They were accompanied by the floats from a local matsuri, the Inuyama Matsuri (犬山祭), which is registered as UNESCO Intangible Heritage, and they were pulled to the local jinja, Haritsuna Jinja (針綱神社), that is responsible for the Inuyama Matsuri. Here, ceremonies were performed for the timber, and under the watchful eyes of local priests, it spent the night there.
On the 7th, it followed the road along the Kiso river, because in the past the logs were transported by water, visiting six jinja before being welcomed to Masumida Jinja (真清田神社) with a ceremony. This is where it spent the night, before being sent off again the next morning with another ceremony. On the 8th, there were events and ceremonies at a branch of JA (the national agricultural organisation) and another two jinja, before it arrived in Kuwana, in Mië Prefecture.
The timber from Gifu received similar treatment. After being felled, it spent the night at Moriyama Jinja (護山神社), and left on the following day, the 6th. These trunks seem to have been greeted with ceremonies, and in at least some cases ceremonially pulled through the streets, at five jinja. The most detail is given about what happened at Nangū Taisha (南宮大社).
According to the article, the sacred timber first visited this jinja at the last Shikinen Sengū, so this was only the second time. The trees were greeted with a taiko performance and a sacred ceremony, and then pulled, by about 1,100 people, from the Great Torii to the sanctuaries, a distance of about 500 metres. Children waved flags, music and drums were played, and guns were fired in salute. (There must have been a huge amount of paperwork to get that last one authorised. Maybe the local police chief is a member of the group that did it.) When the trees reached the sanctuaries, another ceremony was performed to welcome them, more taiko were played, and mochi rice cakes were thrown to the crowds.
The trees from Gifu also arrived in Kuwana on the 8th, and were met by representatives of Mië Jinjachō and Shizuoka Jinjachō, who were taking over responsibility for them at this point. (The article just says that the people from Shizuoka were there, but not why.) There was a ceremony to welcome the trees to Mië Prefecture (which is where Isë Jingū is), with speeches about how great it was that so many people were involved. The trees were then loaded onto wagons again and pulled along the old Isë road to Kuwana Sōsha (桑名宗社), where they spent the night.
The following morning, the timber was reorganised into the timber for the Inner and Outer Sanctuaries, and loaded onto one truck for each destination, rather than origin (thus solving one of the mysteries from the last post). The trucks visited another jinja, and then the Inner Sanctuary truck went straight to Isë, for the ceremonies described in the last post, while the Outer Sanctuary truck spent the night at Mië Prefecture Gokoku Jinja (三重縣護国神社), before heading to Isë the following day.
The events in Isë are described in the previous article.