It is said that Ieyasu Tokugawa was the first person to watch fireworks in Japan.

According to descriptions in "Sunpu Seijitsuroku" (Sunpu Political Record), "Imperial Secrets" and "Butoku Henen Shusei" written in the Edo period (1603-1868), on August 3, 1613, a merchant from Ming Dynasty China guided John Sailis, the British envoy to Sunpu Castle to visit Tokugawa Ieyasu in Sunpu and presented him with guns and telescopes.

This is believed to be the oldest reliable record of fireworks.

At this time, the fireworks are made by filling a tube of bamboo with black gunpowder and igniting one of the tubes to make it blow out firecrackers, which are called "spouting fireworks".

This led Tokugawa Ieyasu to order the artillery of Mikawa to make fireworks for viewing, which is the origin of fireworks in Japan.

The Shizuoka Festival's Hand-carried Fireworks is a reproduction of the fireworks that Ieyasu watched.
The event takes place at night in Sunpu Castle Park.

Of course, it may not have been as heroic as this back then, but please enjoy the beginning of the history of heroic fireworks as seen by Lord Tokugawa Ieyasu.