A team of specialists in Nara, Japan, has unearthed a set of 8th-century ritual staffs decorated with jade beads and iron rings. Found within a sealed cache beneath a mountain shrine, these artifacts are believed to have been used by Shugendo practitioners or local ritualists during the 'Mountain-God' (Yama-no-Kami) festivals that marked the start of the agricultural season.
The staffs are remarkably well-preserved, showing traces of red cinnabar and remnants of hemp streamers. According to the Nara National Research Institute, the discovery confirms that current Matsuri traditions involving processional staffs have a direct lineage to the religious reforms of the Nara period, where indigenous mountain worship was first integrated into state-sanctioned Shinto practices.