Taimatsu Akashi: Giant Torches Blazing on Mount Gorozan

Every year on the second Saturday of November, the city of Sukagawa in Fukushima Prefecture sets a hillside on fire. Taimatsu Akashi is a torch festival with more than 430 years of history, and its stage is Gorozan, a low hill inside Suigaoka Park on the edge of the town centre. Giant torches, including a main one roughly 10 metres long and weighing about 3 tonnes, are raised on the slope and lit together once darkness falls. Behind the spectacle lies a memorial: the festival is said to have begun as a way of comforting the souls of those who died when Sukagawa Castle fell to the armies of Date Masamune.

A Hillside of Flame

By late afternoon around twenty large torches stand on the slope of Gorozan, with the biggest towering at the centre. When the flames catch, the dry crackle of burning straw and bamboo echoes across the little valley and sparks pour up into the black November sky. Even from viewing areas dozens of metres away you feel the heat on your face, and the smell of scorched straw drifts through the crowd. Faces around you glow orange, and the deep pulse of the taiko drums travels through your chest. Photographs capture the colour, but the heat and the sound are what people remember.

The Torch Procession

The evening begins down in the streets. A sacred flame is received at Nikaido Shrine and carried towards the hill, while young people, many of them students from local junior high schools, shoulder the torches and move along Taimatsu Dori, the street named after the festival. Children carry smaller hand torches, turning the roadside into a ribbon of moving light. Because the route runs through an ordinary shopping street, spectators stand remarkably close to the flames. Note that carrying and raising the very largest torch by hand has been reviewed in recent years for safety reasons, so the content of the procession changes from year to year. Check the city website before you travel.

Why the Fires Are Lit

In 1589, after defeating the Ashina at Suriagehara, Date Masamune turned towards Sukagawa. The castle was held by Daijoin, a nun who was Masamune's own aunt, and she refused to surrender to the man who had destroyed the house her son had led. Before dawn on the twenty sixth day of the tenth month the attack came, fierce fighting broke out at Hachimanzaki and Amayobiguchi, and betrayal from within left the castle in flames. During the Edo period local people gathered on the tenth day of the tenth lunar month to throw burning brands at one another in memory of the dead, and that custom gradually evolved into the festival held today.

Tips for Visiting

November nights here are genuinely cold, so bring a heavy jacket, gloves and a hand warmer, and wear shoes you can walk in. The viewing area is grass and sloping ground that turns muddy after rain. Gorozan is busiest right before the lighting, so claim a spot early. Sparks drift a long way, and cotton outerwear is safer than synthetic fabrics. Families with small children may prefer to watch from further back, where the whole hillside is visible at once. The street procession and the lighting happen in different places, so decide in advance which you want to see properly.

Getting There

Suigaoka Park is about a 15 minute walk from Sukagawa Station on the JR Tohoku Main Line. By car it is roughly 10 minutes from the Sukagawa interchange of the Tohoku Expressway, but traffic restrictions apply and the free temporary car parks fill quickly. Street parking is prohibited, so the train from Koriyama is more reliable. In some years a paid shuttle bus operates.

Practical Information

• When: Every year on the second Saturday of November
• Where: Gorozan hill, Suigaoka Park, 5 Atagoyama, Sukagawa City, Fukushima
• Organiser: Taimatsu Akashi Executive Committee, tel. 0248-88-9144
• Access: About 15 minutes on foot from Sukagawa Station (JR Tohoku Main Line)
• Parking: Free temporary car parks near the site, limited capacity; street parking prohibited
• Official website: https://www.city.sukagawa.fukushima.jp/kanko_sukagawa/event/taimatsu_akashi/index.html

* Dates, details and prices are subject to change. Please check the official website before you go.

(Sources: Sukagawa City official website, Sukagawa City Tourism and Products Promotion Association official website, Tohoku Tourism Promotion Organization official website)