F E S T I V A L ／ FEST-190
Gaungaun Festival (Gaungaun Matsuri)
ガウンガウン祭がうんがうんまつり
The Gaungaun Festival is a spring rice-planting ritual drama (ta-uchi, a "field-tilling" pre-harvest rite) held at Fukada Shrine in the Nomoto district of Ichikikushikino City, Kagoshima Prefecture. Its formal name is "The Performing Art Accompanying the Spring Festival of Fukada Shrine (Ta-uchi)," and it was designated an Intangible Folk Cultural Property of Kagoshima Prefecture in 1962. After the Shinto rites conclude, the shrine grounds in front of the main hall are treated as a paddy field, and four men in costume — Techo (the father, also called the "rich man"), the brothers Taro and Jiro, and one playing an ox — improvise the full cycle of rice cultivation, from flooding the field through harrowing to planting, in a comic performance with no fixed lines. The centerpiece is Techo, alongside the ox, dragging a large forked-tree implement (modeled on a manga harrow) to till the field; the chant "gaun-gaun" he calls out as he works is said to be the origin of the festival's popular name, with "gau" traced to a word meaning ox or grass. Performers and spectators dissolve into shared laughter — Techo even chases children around the grounds — preserving the warm, earthy spirit characteristic of ta-uchi folk performance.
H I G H L I G H T S
Highlights
- 01The grotesque costume of Techo (the father role): an ox mask with horns, straw decorations, and white robes
- 02The ta-uchi (field-tilling) pantomime, in which a large forked-tree implement (a mock manga harrow) is dragged across the ground with the ox to 'till' the paddy
- 03The 'gaun-gaun' chant and the line-free, improvised comic drama of the rice-growing year
- 04Moments where Techo chases the watching children, fusing performers and audience in collective laughter
D E E P D I V E