Iomante

Meaning of the name

In Ainu the word is built from three parts: i, meaning "that"; oman, to go or be sent to the mountains; and te, a suffix meaning to make something happen. Together it says "to make that go", and so "to send it home". People apply the term to game animals including owls, foxes and raccoon dogs. Sending off a squirrel or a hare, or giving a farewell to broken tools and vessels, may be called an iwakte. In present-day use, iomante usually means the sending carried out for the brown bear, the one bear species that lives wild in Hokkaido. John Batchelor, writing in 1901, translated the word as "sacrifice" but warned that this misses the point: the offering is made to the animal itself, not to another god.

Raising the cub

Towards the end of winter, around February, hunters take a young bear from the open ground, or find one born while its mother slept through the cold months. The mother is killed and the cub is carried back to the village. At first it lives indoors and is fed like a child, even nursed at the breast until its teeth come. Once it is weaned and heavier, it moves to a pen of logs, the heper-set, named for the very young animal inside. There it is given good food, meals of the sort a guest would be offered. It stays one, two or sometimes three years.

The killing

When the sending season comes, the bear is brought out of its pen. A cord called the heper-tush dangles between the logs; when it slips round the animal's neck, the lower logs are taken away and the bear is led to ground prepared outside a house. There women clap, sing festival songs and dance to amuse it. Dressed in a ponpake apron of woven shavings, the bear is tied to a decorated stake. Men then shoot blunt arrows at it, the heper-ay, known in Japanese as flower arrows, tipped with small hooks and often trailed with silk. This goes on until sunset. The bear is then choked between heavy logs, or, if it has grown too large, killed by a skilled elder's real arrow through the heart.

Sending the head home

Once the bear is butchered, the skull is stripped of flesh and taken indoors to be decorated, a step the Ainu call un-memke. It is set before the hearth and its hollows, such as the eye sockets, are packed with curled wood shavings. In some districts the ears are deliberately left on. A strip of tissue is shaped into a loop and bound with shavings to make a carrying rope for the god's gifts. Offerings are laid out: dumplings, sake, a necklace, bows, a decorated sword, and sometimes the woven crown an elder wears. A farewell prayer is said. The skull then passes out through the spirit window and is fastened to a mounting pole, where it may be wrapped in the bear's own pelt.

Walnuts and the feast

Before the bear is killed, food and useful things are bundled into a rolled mat so the god can carry them away: dried fish, dumplings made of millet or rice flour, arrows, and in some accounts millet cakes. Alcohol, once brewed from millet, is offered in a tall cup. In the form of the rite seen in the modern period, walnuts and chestnuts are thrown to the crowd once the animal is dead, and people scramble for them. At Fushiko in Tokachi, and at Suwankotan, which now belongs to Shibecha in Kushiro, elders did the throwing. Some writers think this habit came from Japanese shrine practice, where rice cakes are tossed in the same way. The meat is eaten on the following day, at a great feast called Poro-Ome-Kabu.

How Iomante is kept

A cub is taken in late winter and raised in or near the house. In the festival season it is led from its pen to ground outside a home. Village women sing and dance for it while men tie it to a decorated stake. Blunt arrows are shot at it through the day. It is killed between logs, or by an elder's arrow, and an arrow is shot into the sky. The skull is decorated indoors with wood shavings, offered food and objects, then carried out through the spirit window and raised on a pole. The meat is eaten the next day.

When and where

The rite is tied to the bear-sending season, not to a fixed date. Cubs are usually taken as winter ends, around February, either from the open ground or after the mother is killed during her hibernation. The feast on the meat falls on the day after the killing, and dancing and drinking may continue to the third night.

It belongs to the Ainu of Hokkaido and Sakhalin. Written records and later practice put the rite in Hokkaido villages. Fushiko in Tokachi is named, and so is Suwankotan, once in the Nishibetsu area of Nemuro and now part of Shibecha in Kushiro. Details of the ceremony, from the wording of the terms to the way the skull is dressed, vary from one district to the next.

What Iomante means

Those who keep the rite say the bear is a god visiting the village. Its body is only a covering, a disguise it can shed. The killing is therefore not an ending: the god goes home to the land of the gods, carrying the gifts and food prepared for the journey, and the meat and hide left behind are his thanks for the welcome he was given. This is why the cub is treated as an honoured guest while it lives, and why the farewell is a ceremonial one, with songs, prayers and gifts.

Questions people ask about Iomante

See also

MikoA woman who serves at a Shinto shrine, dancing, cleansing and helping with ritesOvooA stone cairn on a peak or pass, circled by travellers and honoured in sky worshipHoly FireA fire ceremony in Jerusalem each year, kept by Orthodox Christians before EasterPretaOfferings and rites for spirits enduring deep hunger across Asian traditions.

Good reading and sources

• Iomante on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Traditions differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-05.