The Roving Ronin Report

2010 Hirosaki Neputa Matsuri My second night in Aomori Prefecture I went to the city of Hirosaki for its Neputa Matsuri, a festival where they predominately use fan-shaped floats with painted pictures on them. The paintings depict scenes from Japanese and Chinese history and legend. Neputa is seen more like a parade for going to war so the scenes are more warlike and on the back are often paintings of women who represent the women who would say farewell to their warriors. Because of the warlike nature of Neputa, some of the paintings can be a bit gory with bloody severed heads. There is also a brief demonstration of using the katana. This is my fourth time to the festival and it's one of my favorite being different each year as they make new floats every year.

Overshadowed Neputa Festival Shines With an Artistic Light Hirosaki’s Neputa Festival Presents Finely Painted Floats of War and Peace A Traditional Fan-Shaped Neputa Float The Neputa Festival of Hirosaki, in northern Japan, suffers from being overshadowed by its more famous sister festival, the Nebuta Festival of Aomori City. Even many Japanese have never heard of it. Many think the word “Neputa” is just another word for “Nebuta” or a slip of the tongue. This is unfortunate because the Neputa festival is worthy of recognition in its own right. A Kagami-e Fighting Scene The first recorded Neputa festival goes back to 1722 but the festival itself is no doubt older. The Neputa festival has been named an important intangible national cultural heritage custom. The traditional floats of Neputa are not the three-dimensional ones like those of the Nebuta Festival, though some of those type floats are used in the procession. The Neputa floats are two-dimensional large flat fan-shaped floats wi...