Daimokutate
Daimokutate | |
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Country | Japan |
Reference | 00276 |
Inscription history | |
List | Representative list |
The Daimokutate (題目立) is a recitation show that is performed at Yahashira Shrine in Kami-fukawa village, near the city of
The Shinto Temple in Kamifukawa has a tradition of accepting a 17-year-old boy as a member of a religious organization that carries out religious ceremonies at the temple. The acceptance of a boy into the organization at the temple is an acknowledgment that the child has become an adult.
The performance
Young men, aged 17 (If there are not enough boys aged 17 years, boys who are not yet 17 years old or are over 17 years old are also included in the performance) stand in a semi-circle dressed in samurai clothes and carrying
Originally a rite of passage at the age of seventeen to mark the formal acceptance of the eldest son into the community of the twenty-two families of Kami-fukawa, the Daimokutate is now performed annually in mid-October by young men of various ages and from many different families. Unique in Japan as a dramatic performance without acting or music, the Daimokutate is an important marker of identity and plays an indispensable role in maintaining solidarity in this mountainous town.[3]
History
The Daimokutate was performed around the end of the Muromachi period. Daimokutate is the last living example of a tradition of reciting in sanctuary performed by ordinary people, attested for the first time in a document of 1534.[3]
Documents collected by the folklore specialist Hosen Jungo between 1953 and 1955, have been preserved, but it is likely that the repertoire was much larger.[1][3]
Daimokutate was inscribed in 2009 on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Lists.[4]