Taga Taisha Niinamesai (Honenko Autumn Grand Festival)

About this event

The Niinamesai harvest festival will be performed at Taga Taisha Shrine as the Honenko Autumn Grand Festival. Recorded in the shrine's annual festival calendar, this sacred ceremony offers harvested new rice to the gods in gratitude. Each year in preparation for this rite, rice seedlings planted during the Otaue Matsuri rice-planting festival in June are carefully tended, and the ears of rice harvested during the Nuibo Matsuri in September are presented as brown rice. During Niinamesai, gratitude is expressed toward agrarian culture during the harvest season, celebrating a year of abundance. A solemn Shinto ritual is conducted as priests present harvested offerings before the altar to give thanks for divine grace. Long revered as a deity granting longevity, good relationships, and protection from misfortune, Taga Taisha Shrine offers a valuable opportunity through this festival to experience traditional Japanese agricultural culture and Shinto faith.

Venue

Taga Taisha Shrine

604 Taga, Taga-cho, Inukami-gun, Shiga 522-0341