Japan's thousand-year-old samurai horse festival has survived wars, earthquakes and a nuclear disaster. Now it's battling a new challenge – climate change.
The Soma Nomaoi began as a way to train mounted warriors and it still looks the same a millennium later, with riders dressed in samurai armour competing in horseback events.
Until 2024, the festival took place at the height of Japan's gruelling summers, which had become so hot that riders and spectators were collapsing and horses dying of heatstroke.
That prompted organizers to switch the festival to the cooler temperatures of late May.
Horsemen clad in samurai armor arrive at Hibarigahara field during the Soma Nomaoi festival in Minamisoma, Fukushima prefecture, Japan, May 24, 2026. (AFP Photo)
