| There are a great number of summer festivals held in Osaka. Edo (Tokyo) and Kyoto, cities that were similar in importance to Osaka during the Edo Period, mostly hold their festivals during fall and spring each year, thus avoiding the dog days of summer. In Kyoto, there is a sense that the Gion-Matsuri Festival is the only big festival of summer, despite that city’s pride in conducting approximately 100 festivals each year. In Osaka, there are approximately 100 Shinto shrines, and this equates to approximately 100 summer festivals of varying size. Indeed, the popularity of summer festivals in Osaka is perhaps related to the urban environment of the city. Compared to rural areas, cities have higher population densities. As such, once a disease epidemic starts, it can quickly spread throughout a city. To prevent such occurrences, etc., and to purify the population, people living in urban centers such as Osaka used to actively engage in festival activities. Such activities were also associated with Shinto purification rites, such being conducted in summer. Such rites were traditionally conducted twice each year, once at the end of June in order to cover the first 6 months of the year, and once again at year’s end on New Year’s Eve. Such activities were held to both absolve people of their sins and to offer them a sense of purification.
Purification rites held at the end of June were specifically designed to protect against disease during the summer months. Such rites responded to a need to counter those epidemics that traditionally occurred in urban areas. Over time, such rites evolved into the traditions that became the basis of Osaka’s major summer festivals. This evolution can be better understood by considering the naming of different festivals, Ikasuri Festival was originally called Ikasuri-misogi (misogi being a Japanese word for purification), the Tenjin Matsuri Festival was originally Tenman-misogi, while the Sumiyoshi Festival was just called the Oharai (rites related to the driving out of evil). As such, these names highlight the linkage between Osaka’s summer festivals and Shinto purification rites.
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