Djirau shooting, a centuries-old tradition to rediscover

“It really is a very old tradition: around 1590, a brotherhood of archers was founded to defend a piece of the Holy Cross which is in the church of Marbais explains Grégoire Germeau, one of the archers. Every year, during the Tour Sainte-Croix, this relic is paraded around the village and the week before, the king is appointed to protect it.”

Before the shooting, the Brotherhood of Archers goes to the king of the previous year, forming a procession to take him to the meadow where his title is put back into play. It is the king who tries his luck first , and the game ends as soon as the djirau, hit by an arrow, falls to the ground. It can last a few minutes… or several hours.

The crowned king three years in a row is proclaimed emperor. A title for life… very unusual since the last emperor was crowned in 1968, and this has only happened three times in 500 years!

If this secular tradition has persisted since the Middle Ages, the ducasse which surrounds the event had disappeared about ten years ago. A committee set it up again in 2019, but two years of a pandemic prevented it from continuing on this path.

The committee is therefore more motivated than ever and this weekend, many activities will be offered as part of this “ducasse du djireau”: concerts, fairground attractions, games and card competitions…

And above all various activities related to archery such as a relay race on Saturday morning where the relay will be passed while aiming for a target, or in the afternoon a “flag shooting”: a flag will be planted in the meadow of the djirau and shooting towards the sky, the archers must plant their arrow as close as possible to this target.

The complete program of festivities is detailed on the site www.djirau.be as well as on the event’s Facebook page.