Tagata Jinja Shrine's Honen Festival
Date: Mar 15,2026(Sun)
A unique festival to write home about
The Honen Festival, held every March 15, has to be one of the rarest festivals in Japan. The festival features a 60-cm-diameter, more than 2-meter-long penis carved from Kiso cypress and placed on a portable shrine. Men at an unlucky age by Japanese superstition carry the portable shrine on their shoulders along to different stops until Tagata Jinja Shrine, where prayers are offered for a bountiful cereal harvest, universal development, and fertility.
As the old haiku states, "From the pastures to the mountains, All who come leave with smiles, From the Tagata Festival." People from all over—many from abroad coming out to see this unusual festival—can't help but smile.
The Honen Festival is designated an intangible folk cultural property of Komaki City by the Komaki City Board of Education. A portable shrine leaves its location of housing at Shimmeisha Shrine at 2:00 pm and arrives at Tagata Jinja Shrine after a lavish procession.
EVENT OVERVIEW
| Date | 10:00 am–4:00 pm |
|---|---|
| Place | Tagata Jinja Shrine |
| Location | 〒485-0004 152 Tagata-cho, Komaki-shi, Aichi |
| Parking | Parking unavailable for event-goers on the day of the Honen Festival. Please use public transportation. |
| Phone number | 0568-76-2906 |
| Volunteer guides | English guidance is available to foreign visitors thanks to the Komaki Interpretation Volunteer Society. Contact the Society by Fri, Mar 14 and meet your guide at Tagata Jinja Shrine's Main Hall from 10:00 am on the day of the festival. Phone: 090-8072-2817 Email: noopy2476@yahoo.co.jp |
Note: This page may not be current due to update time differences between site databases.
Should accuracy be critical, please verify this information using a direct source, whenever possible.
ACCESS
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- Access by public transport
- Change from Inuyama Station on the Meitetsu Inuyama Line to the Meitetsu Komaki Line and get off at Tagatajinja-Mae Station. Approx. 5-min. walk.
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- Access by car
- Please use public transportation.
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INFORMATION ON THE SURROUNDING AREA
Komaki-City
- Tagata Jinja Shrine
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