murmurYagoro-don Festival
Soo City · Iwagawa Hachiman Shrine (Osumi, Soo City)
Dates and details can change. Always check the official website before you go.
Kagoshima Prefectural Visitors Bureau · Last checked: Oct 11, 2026
Dates
Dates confirmed with official sources
- 2026
- Tue, Nov 3, 2026 Wake-up drums at 1:00, Yagoro-don raised around 6:00, procession in the afternoon
- 2027
- Dates have not been announced yet. Please check the official website.
- Usual timing
- Usually early November
- How the date is set
- Every year on November 3
- Venue
- Iwagawa Hachiman Shrine (Osumi, Soo City)
- City
- Soo City, Kagoshima
About
Iwagawa Hachiman Shrine in the Osumi district of Soo hosts this festival, more than 900 years old and counted among the three great festivals of Kagoshima Prefecture. Its hero is Yagoro-don, a giant standing 4.85 meters tall in plum-dyed robes that use 25 bolts of cloth. He gained wide fame in 1992, when he was invited to Barcelona, Spain, as Japan's representative at a gathering of giants. The day starts in the dead of night: at 1:00 drums sound through town announcing that Yagoro-don is getting up, and around 6:00 the dressed giant is pulled to his feet with ropes in the shrine grounds. The big moment is the hamakudari procession in the afternoon, when he leaves the shrine and makes his way through town for about 3 hours, ringed by crowds of onlookers.
Sources
- OfficialKagoshima Prefectural Visitors Bureau www.kagoshima-kankou.com
- OfficialSoo City Tourism Association soo-navi.jp
Last checked: Oct 11, 2026. Event information is based on official announcements, but changes may not always be reflected here. Please check each official website for accurate details.
Other events this month
On the day, see what locals are murmuring on the murmur map
murmur is an app that shows short, anonymous posts on a map, right where they were written. On festival day, open the map around the venue and see what people nearby are saying.