Nagoya Features Nagoya Festival

Nagoya Festival 2009

We would like to share some video clips and pictures which show part of Nagoya Festival 2009. One of the main features of Nagoya Festival is the parade of Samurai warriors called "Eiketsu Gyoretsu (English: warriors' procession)." "Eiketsu," literally meaning heroes, are Nobunaga Oda, Hideyoshi Toyotomi, and Ieyasu Tokugawa. These three (in the above order) contributed to unifying the war-torn Japan around 16th century. They are originated from Aichi Prefecture, where Nagoya is located. Every year, on the first weekend of October, Nagoya Festival features the procession to commemorate these three hero warriors.



This above clip shows how warriors wear a suit of armor, which looks very heavy.




This video clip shows the procession of Nobunaga Oda. He is the first warrior who rides on a horse. You can see his wife, Nohime, on the roof of a car after the process of her maids (in yellow kimono with a Naginata sword).

These are infantrymen in armor. You can see how heavy their armor is.

The samurai warrior on the horseback is a little higher ranking warrior than infantrymen shown in the previous picture.

This picture shows a unit of Horagai, which announces the start of a battle with the sound of trumpet shells.

This picture shows Nobunaga Oda's family crest (on the top of the pole), which was hoisted in the battle with other warriors.

The above two pictures show the procession of Hideyoshi Toyotomi. The second one shows Hideyoshi himself.

This is Hideyoshi's wife Nene.

This is Nene's maid. The below two pictures show how lower-ranking maids look like, compared with this high-ranking maid in this pictures.

The above picture (in white kimono) shows that maids are supposed to protect their master called hime (Englsih: princess) with Naginata (longer blade) swords.
This picture shows Ieyasu Tokugawa, who started the Tokugawa or Edo Shogunate in 1603. Although Ieyasu himself is far back of this picture, you can see his family crest clearly.
The above picture shows a carrier in the Edo era. Interestingly, the shown carrier was actually for Tokugawa's dog called Oinusama, which was adored and protected by Tokugawa Shogunate.