Atsuki Shinmei Festival

This traditional event has a history dating back to 1644. It is a fire festival held in the Atsuki district every year on February 11 (a National Holiday) to pray for plentiful crops and to ward off disasters and illness.
In 2009, it was designated a Nationally-Important Intangible Folk Cultural Property. The festival begins when young people dressed in white, after purifying themselves by washing, raise two approximately 20 meter-high ceremonial poles to the east and west.
After dancing the Shinmei-Odori dance around the poles in the day and night, both poles are set on fire. Then the poles are lowered to the ground, and the festival comes to a close.