Step-on pictures, or fumi-e, or ebumi, were images of the Virgin Mary or of Jesus that Japanese authorities used to make people step upon to test their faith in Christianity. Once a year a whole village or region under the rule of a certain daimyo had to come to a certain place where they were forced to step on the picture. This practice was executed during the Tokugawa regime, in an effort to ban Christianity from the country. By 1629 this practice was generally spread throughout Japan and it was only abandoned completely at the beginning of the Meiji period. All kinds of media were used to make images: wood, stone, prints and bronze. Not many fumi-e survived.