Japan in the Period of 0 A.D.

[Genava55]

Emishi culture with horse archer warfare (thought to be the origin of the samurai archery tradition):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emishi

http://emishi-ezo.net/

http://emishi-ezo.net/WhoEmishi.htm

http://emishi-ezo.net/Conquest/DestructionOfCastle.html

[Lion.Kanzen]

 

[Nescio]

Today I stumbled on this image listing all Japanese emperors:

I'm sharing it here because the way the data are visually presented is novel to me, but I think it's excellent.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

It would be interesting to, in addition to representing Japan proper, to also include some of the cultures from Hokkaido like the Emishi, as Geneva mentioned.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

2 hours ago, Thorfinn the Shallow Minded said:

It would be interesting to, in addition to representing Japan proper, to also include some of the cultures from Hokkaido like the Emishi, as Geneva mentioned.

Perhaps as a miniciv, mercenaries, or capturable fishing villages? 

Edited May 12, 2019 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[Lion.Kanzen]

5 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

there is a SVG file from original.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6a/Emperors_Of_Japan.svg

 

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

the Ainu culture from japan was the merge with Jomon and others before Japs conquer them

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Recent research suggests that Ainu culture originated from a merger of the Jomon, Okhotsk and Satsumon cultures.[6] These early inhabitants did not speak the Japanese language and were conquered by the Japanese early in the 9th century.

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At the end of the Yayoi period, to defend the war and defend the homeland, the people built strong fortresses and local organizations scattered throughout the island. Archaeological evidence shows that as the climate warms, sea levels rise and seawater floods the coastal rice fields. Private property, construction flood control projects continued to be implemented. This trend is quite controversial, which forces farmers to plough Heights, which led the elite to do everything possible for territorial expansion, development of productive forces and fighting each other. The introduction of metal products and rice for grain harvesting has led to a sharp increase in population, the formation of social classes and the beginning of the gap between rich and poor, from tribal leaders to small and medium farmers. In the territorial expansion and successive years of war, villagers formed several regional groups.

These small groups have been growing and forming regional tribes with military, economic and political power. Finally, the formation of Izumo, Kibi province, Yamatai, Yamato province, Yoshino and other large tribal groups in the country. These tribes are political, as well as to the central city, walls and moat of resistant canvas defense system firmly defend these areas. With the development of military science and technology, many tribes gained food and power through war during the famine years. In order to show the other face of Himiko and Yamatai, I will prepare it with a State-country, Kyrgyzstan and Japan listed together. Around 250 AD, the Yayoi era ended, when Japan was highly separated and there was no central government.

http://m.qulishi.com/huati/mssd

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At the end of the Yayoi period, to defend the war and defend the homeland, the people built strong fortresses and local organizations scattered throughout the island. Archaeological evidence shows that as the climate warms, sea levels rise and seawater floods the coastal rice fields. Private property, construction flood control projects continued to be implemented. This trend is quite controversial, which forces farmers to plough Heights, which led the elite to do everything possible for territorial expansion, development of productive forces and fighting each other. The introduction of metal products and rice for grain harvesting has led to a sharp increase in population, the formation of social classes and the beginning of the gap between rich and poor, from tribal leaders to small and medium farmers. In the territorial expansion and successive years of war, villagers formed several regional groups.

These small groups have been growing and forming regional tribes with military, economic and political power. Finally, the formation of Izumo, Kibi province, Yamatai, Yamato province, Yoshino and other large tribal groups in the country. These tribes are political, as well as to the central city, walls and moat of resistant canvas defense system firmly defend these areas. With the development of military science and technology, many tribes gained food and power through war during the famine years. In order to show the other face of Himiko and Yamatai, I will prepare it with a State-country, Kyrgyzstan and Japan listed together. Around 250 AD, the Yayoi era ended, when Japan was highly separated and there was no central government.

Japan today is regarded as a small country in many constant wars, as the national situation in the period of the last States at War and the Spring and Fall Period of China and the Period of the States at War. The leader of each tribe or regime began to build his own large mausoleum. In this era, they chose the highlands as the place where the mausoleum was placed, and began quarantining the tomb instead of placing their glorious mausoleum in the group's cemetery and posing with other people's cemeteries. By the end of the Yayoi era, the number and size of tombs increased dramatically, and countless funerary objects. Yayoi elite are buried in a large representative cave-type mounds, these mounds surrounded by canals, known as the "circle in front of the" tomb. "Han Han Shu", "Wei Zhi" and "Sui Shu" did not say that the humble thing is to stop attacking Gunai territory.
 

early Yayoi.

Edited May 12, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

On 11/1/2018 at 1:35 PM, Genava55 said:

Emishi culture with horse archer warfare (thought to be the origin of the samurai archery tradition):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emishi

http://emishi-ezo.net/

http://emishi-ezo.net/WhoEmishi.htm

http://emishi-ezo.net/Conquest/DestructionOfCastle.html

were related to Ainu.

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Today there is not one single Emishi left. They've been long extinct by the Japanese ( Yamato )  who had 30 years war with Ainu. The Japanese are essentially continental asians ( with slight Jomon influence) while Emishi were pure Jomon and predominant Jomon , both of them are complete two different people.

They disappeared slowly by absortion to the Yamato culture and by intermarriage with Yamato peoples. Modern Japanese people as a all still have one-third of their genetic data tracing to the ancient Jomon peoples.

Edited May 12, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

Jomon

 Reconstructed Jomon village.

 

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the Jomon people were making clay figures and vessels decorated with patterns made by impressing the wet clay with braided or unbraided cord and sticks (jomon means 'patterns of plaited cord') with a growing sophistication. These people also used chipped stone tools, traps, and bows and were hunters, gatherers, and skillful coastal and deep-water fishermen. They practiced a rudimentary form of agriculture and lived in caves and later in groups of either temporary shallow pit dwellings or above-ground houses, leaving rich kitchen middens for modern anthropological study.

By the late Jomon period, a dramatic shift had taken place according to archaeological studies. Incipient cultivation had evolved into sophisticated rice-paddy farming and government control. Many other elements of Japanese culture also may date from this period and reflect a mingled migration from the northern Asian continent and the southern Pacific areas. Among these elements are Shinto mythology, marriage customs, architectural styles, and technological developments, such as lacquerware, textiles, metalworking, and glass making.

 

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The Jomon period experienced a large-scale climate change since it extended for a long period of 10,000 years. The Sannai-Maruyama Ruins are the largest ruins of a Jomon-period (about 10,500-300 BC) village in Japan, and are estimated to date from 4,000 to 5,500 years ago. The Japanese archipelago is extremely elongated from north to south and its topography varies considerably; therefore, regional differences in the climate and vegetation were large during the Jomon period as is today. As a result, the cultural style of the Jomon period is not uniform both historically and regionally and it came to take many different forms.

There have been previous excavations around the Sannai-Maruyama site between 1953 to 1967. These excavations involved teams from Keio University and the Board of Education of Aomori City. In 1976 and 1987, the Board of Education of Aomori Prefecture and Aomori City also conducted further excavations on the southern part of the site.

However, the major breakthrough for the site came in 1992 while excavating during a pre-construction phase for a baseball stadium. This excavation uncovered how large Sannai Maruyama was as well as a large amount of artifacts. 

After the excavation and study of the site, the village was reburied with earth and a number of reconstructed pit dwellings, long houses and a large tower were built on top. Visitors can enter the reconstructions, some of which are quite large, as well as see a few of the original excavation sites around the grounds.

A large amount of potsherds and stone implements, clay figurines, jade beads, etc. were disposed together with the soil and formed a mound for over 1000 years. You can see its cross-section here. X-ray analysis shows that the jade excavated at ‘Sannai-Maruyama Site’ in Aomori Prefecture is from Itoigawa; therefore, it is assumed that the Jomon people also traded among themselves over the wide area.

https://www.vikipandit.com/the-ruins-of-sannai-maruyama/

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Jomon is the name of the early Holocene period hunter-gatherers of Japan, beginning about 14,000 B.C.E. and ending about 1000 B.C.E. in southwestern Japan and 500 C.E. in northeastern Japan. The Jomon made stone and bone tools, and pottery beginning at a few sites as early as 15,500 years ago. The word Jomon means 'cord pattern', and it refers to the cord-marked impressions seen on Jomon pottery.

Jomon Chronology

Incipient Jomon (14,000–8000 B.C.E.) (@#$%ui Cave, Odai Yamamoto I)

Initial Jomon (8000–4800 B.C.E.) (Natsushima)

Early Jomon (ca 4800–3000 B.C.E.) (Hamanasuno, Tochibara Rockshelter, Sannai Maruyama, Torihama Shell Mound)

Middle Jomon (ca 3000–2000 B.C.E.) (Sannai Maruyama, Usujiri)

Late Jomon (ca. 2000–1000 B.C.E.) (Hamanaka 2)

Final (1000–100 B.C.E.) (Kamegaoka)

Epi-Jomon (100 B.C.E.–500 C.E.) (Sapporo Eki Kita-Guchi)

The Early and Middle Jomon lived in hamlets or villages of semi-subterranean pit houses, excavated up to about one meter into the earth. By the late Jomon period and perhaps as a response to climate change and a lowering of sea levels, the Jomon moved into fewer villages sited mainly on the coastlines and there relied increasingly on river and ocean fishing, and shellfish. The Jomon diet was based on a mixed economy of hunting, gathering, and fishing, with some evidence for gardens with millet, and possibly gourd, buckwheat, and azuki bean.

Jomon Pottery

The earliest pottery forms of the Jomon were low-fired, round and pointed-based forms, created during the Initial period. Flat-based pottery characterized the Early Jomon period. Cylindrical pots are characteristic of northeastern Japan, and similar styles are known from mainland China, which may or may not suggest direct contact. By the Middle Jomon period, a variety of jars, bowls, and other vessels were in use.

The Jomon have been the focus of much debate concerning the invention of pottery. Scholars today debate whether pottery was a local invention or diffused from the mainland; by 12,000 B.C.E. low-fired pottery was in use throughout East Asia. @#$%ui Cave has radiocarbon dates ca. 15,800–14,200 calibrated years BP on associated charcoal, but Xianrendong Cave in mainland China so far holds the oldest pottery vessels discovered on the planet, by perhaps a thousand years or so. Other sites such as Odai Yamomoto in Aomori prefecture have been found to date the same period as @#$%ui Cave, or somewhat older.

Jomon Burials and Earthworks

Jomon earthworks are noted by end of the Late Jomon period, consisting of stone circles around cemetery plots, such as at Ohyo. Circular spaces with earthen walls up to several meters high and up to 10 meters (30.5 feet) thick at the base were built at several sites such as Chitose. These burials were often layered with red ochre and were accompanied by polished stone staffs which may represent rank.

By the Late Jomon period, evidence for ritual activities is noted at sites by elaborate grave goods such as masks with goggle eyes and anthropomorphic figurines accompanying burials placed in ceramic pots. By the Final period, farming of barley, wheat, millet, and hemp developed, and the Jomon lifestyle diminished all over the region by 500 C.E.

Scholars debate whether the Jomon were related to the modern Ainu hunter-gatherers of Japan. Genetic studies suggest that they are likely biologically related to the Jomon, but the Jomon culture is not expressed within modern Ainu practices. The known archaeological correlate of the Ainu is called the Satsumon culture, who are believed to have displaced the epi-Jomon about 500 C.E.; Satsumon may be a descendant of the Jomon rather than a replacement.

Important Sites

Sannai Maruyama, @#$%ui Cave, Usujiri, Chitose, Ohyu, Kamegaoka, Natsushima, Hamanasuno, Ocharasenai.

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lopess]

It would certainly be a great civ for Terra Magna. 

[Lion.Kanzen]

AoE DE first mission  was changed and now the background is  Continental invasion to Jomon homeland.

Spoiler

 

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"Qin Shi Huang, The First Emperor of China, feared death and sought a way to achieve immortality. According to legends, he tasked Xu Fu, the court sorcerer and alchemist, with finding an elixir of life on the mythical Penglai Mountain in the islands east of China. According to Chinese accounts, Xu Fu landed on the Kii Peninsula of Japan, near Mount Fuji, in 210 BCE with a crew of soldiers, farmers, and craftsmen. Xu Fu never returned to China, however, presumably making himself king of the islands rather than return home empty-handed. Legends relate that Xu Fu, who become known as Jo@#$%u in Japanese histories, taught the natives of the islands medicinal and farming techniques. He would eventually become on of the possible historical inspirations for the first Japanese emperor, Jimmu.

While archaeological records cannot confirm these legendary events, beginning in 300 BC, rice farmers from mainland Asia settled in the Japanese archipelago and introduced elements of Chinese culture and technology to the islands. The earlier inhabitants of Japan, whose culture is known as Jomon, were a Neolithic people who subsisted primarily thorough hunting, fishing and gathering. They used basic stone and wooden tools and stitched together their clothing from the bark of the mulberry tree. The Jomon are best known for their patterned pottery, from which the culture gets its name. Their earthenware is among the oldest pottery found in the world, with pieces dating to as early as 14,500 BC.

Around 300 BCE, the material culture of Japan become more sophisticated due to mainland influences. Over the next six centuries, a period known as the Yayoi period, Japan saw a technological revolution with the introduction of rice agriculture and metalworking. Chinese historical records from this period describe Japan as a lands of hundreds of scattered tribal communities, often in conflict with one another."

Regarding the original version, the context change between an assassination attempt to an Izumo leader, to the mythical search of the elixir by the Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang by they statesman Xu Fu, killing the Jomon Chieftain in the journey, settling and developing the ancient Japanese culture.

 

Edited May 12, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Alexandermb]

To recover a bit the practice of buildings:

Spoiler

 

[Alexandermb]

Some playing with wood textures and nuba camp roof:

Spoiler

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

searching metatron data... he mentioned this.

 

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Tanko, keik6, uchikake-keiko and men‘ochu,
2nd century BC-9th century AD

 

The early inhabitants of the Japanese archipelago, like many Palaeolithic peoples, almost certainly utilized animal hides and leathers to create various kinds of protective garments. What forms of protective equipment may have existed, however, is unknown due to an absence of historical evidence such as surviving pieces, written records, sculptures or paintings that could attest to the existence of such items.

two varictics are known to have been utilized. One consisted of little more than crudely shaped panels of wood that were often formed from a hollowed log. these were fitted with shoulder straps and lengths of cord or leather that allowed the panel to be tied in place around the torso. A second variety consisted of several wooden slates bound together. These rudimentary cuirasses were probably worn over jackets or vests made from animal hides that had the fur left on them to help make the armour more comfortable to wear.

It should be noted thac much of what is known about these items is actually based on the remnants of the lacquer shells chat carly inhabitants of the Japanese archipelago applied to these items to help protect them from the acidic nature of that region's soil and its extremely high levels of humidity.

While it is impossible to track the evolutionary development of mokusei katchu over the centuries given the scant and fragmentary surviving evidence, it would seem reasonable to conclude that the existing designs and fabrication techniques gradually improved over time. Wood panels were carved or steamed to create curves that were better contoured to the shape of the torso. Cuirasses also began to be assembled from several sectional pieces that were bound together using lengths of cord or leather thongs, called kawa-toji, and some examples of these were strikingly similar in shape to the so-called ‘modern’ forms of tosei-dó that started to appear around the end of the 15th century.

By the 1st century AD, most examples of cuirass were being made from three to five shaped wooden panels. These were fastened together by bindings that allowed the panels to articulate so they could close around the torso. The front panels were designed to come together like a pair of saloon doors in the middle of the chest where they could be tied together to close the cuirass.

Why the large number of unique forms of mokusei katchu that appear to have existed prior to the 1st century AD suddenly faded out in favour of this style is unclear. It may simply have been the result of the next obvious evolutionary step in cuirass designs having being reached. It is far more probable, however, that these changes came about as the result of external influences, namely the continued large influx of migrants from the Korean peninsula who brought with them knowledge of armour designs from the continent that were more advanced than the domestic designs of cuirass that existed within the archipelago during that period.

If che forms of cuirass that began to appear were based on imported types of armour, these apparently merged with some aspects of the indigenous armour designs, which seem to have favoured large, shield-like back panels that stood well above the wearer's shoulders. The shape and style of these back panels varied considerably between regions, as did some aspects of the decorative designs that were engraved or lacquered onto them. An example of mokusei katchu discovered in Iba, in Shizuoka Prefecture, for example, featured round wing-like panels fitted to the rear of the cuirass. This design contrasts sharply with an example of wooden cuirass discovered at an excavation site near Souri, in @#$%uoka Prefecture, which featured a large flat shield- like form of back board affixed to the cuirass. Because the back board on the mokusei katchi from Souri stood well above the shoulder, the middle portion of the back-panel between the shoulder blades had a U-shape indentation cut in it that enabled the person wearing the cuirass to tilt their head backwards.

At some time during the first half of the 4th century AD these regional forms of cuirass faded out as a new design of cuirass from the Korean peninsula gained popularity in the Japanese archipelago. This new form of cuirass was unique in that it was assembled from a 

series of vertical plates, or tatehagi-ita, that were bound together by leather thongs, called kawa-toji, which allowed the armour to be wrapped around the torso like a corset.

The tatehagi-kawa-toji cuirass, as this style of armour came to be known, is presently considered to be the oldest known iron-made form of body amour made and used in the Japanese archipelago. It is probable that the first iron examples of this make of cuirass were imported and then copied domestically, for metal armour of this kind was already being utilized on the Korean peninsula during this period.

 

--------------------—

Japanese armour is thought to have evolved from the armour used in ancient China.[1] Cuirasses and helmets were manufactured in Japan as early as the 4th century CE.[1] Tankō, worn by foot soldiers and keikō, worn by horsemen were both pre-samurai types of early Japanese cuirass constructed from iron plates connected together by leather thongs.

Spoiler

some couraisses are from V century and VI.

here the armor that aren't from this period.

a century  after (V - five) . but i'm not sure if you want allow this. the technology isn't  such sophisticatted as China in this period. is bronze armor.

https://books.google.hn/books?id=kUA_DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA79&lpg=PA79&dq=tatehagi+toji+cuirass&source=bl&ots=RlACBlypSR&sig=ACfU3U0bdKkHKul3_24LA3CoNIlV-n-jUA&hl=es-419&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj5lMW13pbiAhUt1lkKHYQRDGYQ6AEwCnoECAoQAQ#v=onepage&q=tatehagi toji cuirass&f=false

 

Edited May 12, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

Kofun era.

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the most powerful kingdom in Wa was Yamatai, and although there is no consensus on this, its location seems to have been around the Nara area, in the centre of Honshū. It makes quite a lot of sense, since it's right there, called Yamato, where some clans started to get stronger and stronger and ended up unifying a large part of the territory. Interestingly, we know less about the beginnings of this period than the previous one because, apart from the fact that no type of writing has yet been used in Japan, this time we do not have any Chinese historical chronicles on the subject after the death of Queen Himiko. This is because China, at the end of the Han dynasty, was immersed in a period of disunity, a constant throughout its history, and probably had more important matters to deal with. And with respect to the first Japanese chronicles, the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki, written at the beginning of the 8th century, cannot be considered reliable until they begin to relate what happened from the 6th century onwards, any previous reference can be considered mythological rather than historical. Thus, what we know of most of the Kofun period is due to the archaeological remains found, which fortunately are very numerous.

In the Yayoi period there was a stratification of society (due in part to the defense against other peoples, and the cultivation of rice and the possibility of storing it), in this period this process is intensified and we can speak of three very different groups: the family clans called uji, artisans organized by trades in communities called be, and slaves. Some of these warrior clans became more and more powerful due to a great increase in agricultural production caused by the improvement of iron tools, as well as by new irrigation techniques coming from the continent. Thus, these clans were able to maintain larger armies that in turn could conquer larger territories in which to produce more and have surpluses with which to trade in Korea and improve their technology through access to metals and techniques.

One of these Yamato clans, led by Sujin, began to conquer other clans, sometimes by force but many times by negotiation, incorporating enemy clans in exchange for positions within the structure of the dominant kingdom, a characteristic we have observed throughout Japanese history. The Sukhin clan would dominate much of the country, the island of Kyūshū and Honshū to the plain of Kantō (today's Tokyo area), thus unifying the country for the first time, although we can not yet speak of the formation of a state but rather a kind of confederation of clans. Experts seem to agree that Sujin should be considered the first royal emperor in Japanese history, although in Nihon Shoki he appears as the tenth, and is believed to have died in the year 318. Although the "official version" is that the Japanese imperial dynasty has followed an unshakable line since the beginning of time, there seems to be considerable consensus that it dates back to the beginning of the 6th century (which is already a not inconsiderable date) and that before that there were one or perhaps two imperial dynasties, the first of which was initiated by Sukhin.

 

A century later, another clan led by Ōjin seizes power, thus starting a new dynasty. It would be a much more powerful dynasty than the previous one, as symbolized by their tombs, which we will talk about later, and even practiced an expansionist policy in Korea, which at that time was divided between the kingdoms of Silla, Paekche and Koguryo. Throughout the 5th century Japan, or Yamato to be exact, had a great presence in an area of the southeast of the Korean peninsula, called Kaya in Korean and Mimana in Japanese, which was not under the control of any of the three Korean kingdoms and where Yamato traded, mainly buying iron. It is through this area that Chinese and Korean ideas and techniques also enter the archipelago. Yamato presence in Mimana goes so far as to send numerous troops to fight against the other Korean kingdoms, which wanted to conquer this territory. In addition, Yamato had constant military campaigns within Japan to fight in the north of Honshū the emisshi, people considered barbarians (they were people of culture Jōmon, it is believed that increasingly cornered to the north, leading to the current Ainu ethnicity).

The Emperor Ōjin

In the year 507, Emperor Keitai ascends to the throne after the death without descendants of Buretsu, and it is believed that he belongs to a new dynasty which, yes, would be the same one to which the current emperor of Japan belongs. At this time Yamato became less interested in the continent's production techniques, already assimilated, and more in ethical knowledge (Confucianism), religious knowledge (Buddhism and Taoism), writing, literature and history, as well as administrative techniques (laws and censuses), thus preparing the stage for the series of reforms that would characterize the following period. Keitai must face numerous military defeats in Korea as well as a rebellion in Yamato itself, when in 527 a governor of the north of Kyūshū called Iwai refused to send troops to fight in Korea as he had been ordered, so Yamato had to divert troops in turn to fight Iwai, who would end up defeating and killing. In addition, the fall of Mimana into the hands of the Silla kingdom made Yamato focus more on national affairs and, alerted by Iwai's rebellion, realized that the clans in the provinces were becoming dangerously powerful. This increase in their power was due in part to the proliferation of new cultivation and irrigation techniques, which were no longer exclusive to the central part of the country. Throughout the history of Japan (and virtually anywhere else) we have constantly witnessed this cycle of power alternation between center and periphery. Yamato then began to put into practice some of the laws and administrative techniques of the Chinese imperial system, the system known as ritsuryō, which although it would be fully developed in later periods, already appeared at this time. One of the initiatives that was launched was a census of the population, initially only of foreigners and later of all inhabitants. At this time writing was still not widespread in Japan, and we do not keep more than some inscriptions on swords or metal mirrors, but we do know that there were scribes, who were responsible for drawing up these censuses; in fact, it is believed that what Kojiki and Nihon Shoki tell us about this century is based on writings made then.

In this final epoch of the Kofun period we observe for the first time the appearance of another characteristic that is repeated throughout the centuries in the history of Japan, the existence of a very important family within the court, with a decisive role in the government of the country. In this case it would be the Soga family, which appears on the scene when in 536 Soga no Iname takes over a position that we could translate as Grand Minister. 

https://www.historiajaponesa.com/el-periodo-kofun-300-552-algo-mas-que-grandes-tumbas/

Yamatai Kingdom

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Earlier Chinese ca. 432 CE Hou Han Shu (Book of Later/Eastern Han) accounts had described the land of Wa (Japan) as such:

“In the middle of the Lo-lang sea there are the Wa people. They are subdivided into more than a hundred ‘countries'[called communities in some translations]. Depending on the season they come and offer tribute”.

Thirty of these countries were known to have had direct contact with China. Historians equate these “countries” with chiefdoms.

The Chinese Wei Zhi  accounts in 297 A.D. asserted that Yamatai kingdom was the strongest of those countries. Yamatai country was victorious after years of warfare. Gishi no Wajinden noted decades of warfare had ensued until “the people agreed upon a woman for their ruler”, i.e. when Queen Himiko came to the throne. Towards the end of 2nd century, around 30 small chiefdoms had allied with each other to form a confederated kingdom or state known as “Yamatai country” (Yamatai koku) with Queen Himiko at the helm.

Queen Himiko was known to the Chinese because her government had sent a diplomatic mission in the year 238 A.D. to the Wei emperor, Cao Rui’s court, and the delegation was received as presenting tribute to the Chinese emperor. As such, Queen Himiko was recognized as the ruler of Wa :

“Herein we address Himiko (Pimiko is used), Queen of Wa, whom we now officially call a friend of Wei …  [Your ambassadors] have arrived here with your tribute, consisting of four male slaves and six female slaves, together with two pieces of cloth with designs, each twenty feet in length. You live very far away across the sea; yet you have sent an embassy with tribute. Your loyalty and filial piety we appreciate exceedingly. We confer upon you, therefore, the title “Queen of Wa  Friendly to Wei”.”

Queen Himiko may have held the ceremonial role of a shaman priestess, prophetess or perhaps, a pre-eminent shrine maiden with proxy access to the gods for the people. Gishi no Wajinden described her as a having “occupied herself with magic and sorcery, bewitching the people”. Shrouded in mystery, Queen Himiko was said to have controlled the kingdoms by sorcery and magic. She was seldom seen in public and was attended by “one thousand attendants, but only one man”.

https://heritageofjapan.wordpress.com/yayoi-era-yields-up-rice/the-advent-of-agriculture-and-the-rice-revolution/who-was-queen-himiko/

Quote

The Wajinden records that 29 different kuni or “countries” existed and that three of these were ruled by “kings”. One of them was Ito where “there have been kings for generations, subject to the queen’s kuni [Yama’ichi] they rule”. Experts have identified Ito to be Itoshima peninsula and the Hirabaru mound site is thought to contain the grave of Ito‘s king or queen (because it contained 39 bronze mirrors and other rich burial grave goods associated with rulers of the highest order). The Wajinden also hints to us how Himiko ruled:

” high [ranking] Wa are sent to inspect [the trade of the different kuni]. A high leader was especially sent to to the region] north of the queen’s land. He inspects all the kuni there. Regularly he rules in Ito.”

Thus Ito held an important role in international relations.

During her reign, Queen Himiko sent envoys to Gi to limit the influence of a rival power, the “king” of Kunu whose country of Kuna (Kuna no Koku) lay to the south of Wa. In 239 A.D., an emperor of Gi granted the Yamatai kingdom a honorable title “Sin Gi Wa O” along with a gift of 100 bronze mirrors. By 247 A.D. Queen Himiko’s realm and that of the country of Kuna were at odds, but the outcome of that conflict is not known, only that she sought Chinese imperial support and that she died likely in the year following that.

When Queen Himiko died, her people constructed a large burial mound (about 100 meters in diameter) for her. One thousand female and male attendants were sacrificed for burial along with their queen.  She had lived between A.D. 183 and 248 without having ever married.

Upon her death, the male ruler who took her place did not last long and the chiefdoms fell into disunity and fighting. “Assassination and murder followed; more than one thousand were thus slain” according to Gishi no Wajinden. When Iyo, a 13-year old girl related to Himiko was placed on the throne, peace was restored and the fighting ended.

The location of Yamatai kingdom (as well as that of the burial mound of Queen Himiko) remains a mystery and is the subject of a huge academic controversy as to whether northern Kyushu or Kinai had been the actual headquarters of Queen Himiko.

 

Edited May 12, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

Names. given to the land of Japan.

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The earliest mentions of the Japanese were made in various Chinese historical classic texts listed below in the sequence of their compilation dates. Wa (倭, “Japan, Japanese”, from Chinese Wō 倭, Hangul Wae 왜) is the oldest recorded name of Japan. Chinese, Korean, and Japanese scribes regularly wrote Wa or Yamato “Japan” with the Chinese character 倭 which is thought to be synonymous with Yamatai until the 8th century, when the Japanese found fault with it, replacing it with 和 “harmony, peace, balance”.

According to Ichikawa’s Wafu textbook:

During the early Han dynasty (205 BCE – 9 CE) scholars standardised the script, as part of a reconstruction of knowledge following the devastating political upheavals of the short-lived Chin dynasty; the block script they chose remains largely unchanged and is still in use. Despite the Chin devastations – including book burnings, interring of scholars, horrific forced labour – it is still possible to trace the early development of many characters from archaeological inscriptions. Wa (和) was formed by combining two pictograms: rice plant (禾) and open mouth (口). A rice plant has a strong central stem, but it is not brittle and – rather than snap – its pliancy allows it to bend and sway in a breeze. Rice is also the most important of the “five grains”, so that the combined characters forming wa conveys an ancient understanding of the relationship between peaceful state, social harmony and food security.

During the Kofun period (250-538) when kanji were first used in Japan, Yamatö was written with the ateji 倭 for Wa “Japan”. During the Asuka period (538-710) when Japanese place names were standardized into two-character compounds, Yamato was changed to 大倭 with a 大 “big; great” prefix. Following the ca. 757 graphic substitution of 和 for 倭, it was written 大和 “great harmony,” using the Classical Chinese expression dàhé 大和 (e.g., Yijing 1, tr. Wilhelm 1967:371: “each thing receives its true nature and destiny and comes into permanent accord with the Great Harmony.”)

The early Japanese texts above give three transcriptions of Yamato: 夜麻登 (Kojiki), 耶麻騰 (Nihon Shoki), and 山跡 (Man’yōshū). The Kojiki and Nihon Shoki use Sino-Japanese on’yomi readings of ya 夜 “night” or ya or ja 耶 (an interrogative sentence-final particle in Chinese), ma or ba 麻 “hemp”, and tō or to 登 “rise; mount” or tō 騰 “fly; gallop”. In contrast, the Man’yōshū uses Japanese kun’yomi readings of yama 山 “mountain” and to < tö or ato 跡 “track; trace”.

The early Chinese histories above give three transcriptions of Yamatai: 邪馬臺 (Wei Zhi), 邪馬台 (Hou Han Shu), and 邪摩堆 (Sui Shu). The first syllable is consistently written with yé 邪 “a place name”, which was used as a jiajie graphic-loan character for yé 耶 “interrogative sentence-final particle” and xié 邪 “evil; depraved”. The second is written with mǎ 馬 “horse” or mó 摩 “rub; friction”. The third syllable of Yamatai is written tái 臺 or 台 “platform; terrace” (cf. Taiwan 臺灣) or duī 堆 “pile; heap”. Concerning the transcriptional difference between Yamaichi 邪馬壹 in the Wei Zhi and Yamadai or Yamatai 邪馬臺.

Yamato = Yamatai???

Anesaki makes these comments on the etymology of yamato:

The etymology of the word Yamato is disputed. According to the commonly accepted theory it means “Mountain-gateways,” because the region is surrounded by mountains on all sides and opens through a few passages to the regions beyond the mountain ranges. This seems to be a plausible interpretation, because it is most natural to the Japanese language. But it is a puzzling fact that the name is written in Chinese ideograms which mean “great peace.” However, the ideogram meaning “peace” seems to have been used simply for the Chinese appellation of the Japanese “wa,” which, designated in another letter, seems to have meant “dwarf.” Chamberlain’s theory is that Yamato was Ainu in origin and meant “Chestnut and ponds.” But this is improbable when we take into account the fact that the ponds, numerous in the region, are later works for irrigation.

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This map depicts the boundaries of all major civilizations in East Asia at the beginning of the Three Kingdoms Period of China, with italics indicating nomadic bands and other tribal societies. 
Following the collapse of Han Dynasty in 220 CE, three Kingdoms: Cao Wei (220 CE), Shu Han (221 CE), and Wu (229 CE) were established. In the meantime, the Xianbei people defeated Xiongnu and became the most powerful tribe in the north.

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

Yamatai (Yayoi period)

--

blood dancing death deer dotaku(bell)

 

 

yes even anime images,

Edited May 12, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Alexandermb]

43 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Yamatai (Yayoi period)

yes even anime images,

If it has anime it have to be real, i have no doubts

[Lion.Kanzen]

3 minutes ago, Alexandermb said:

If it has anime it have to be real, i have no doubts

afortunadamente las imagenes anteriores confirman esto.

no without joking...  this Yamatai kingdom have some references in anime.

check this from "Jeeg steel robot"-  el vengador in our countries- , I watch this when I was kid. the pants and hair style of left guys are similar.

searching keyword: Yamatai I found a remake.

Spoiler

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

Features from Yayoi period. 

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• During the Yayoi period, he lived in a well house, but soon a high-floor warehouse appeared in order to preserve food.
• The house gradually moved to the upper floor and 20 to 30 houses and warehouses began to be fenced.
• The village was equipped with defensive facilities and had the ability to prevent attacks from external enemies.
• It is also believed that this is due to the need to defend the enemy.
• The presence of defensive facilities is evidence that the war has taken place,
• Among the human bones excavated in the Yayoi period, there are also those with ashes, bronze swords and bronze pots.
• Such human bones are hardly found in the remains of the Jomon period,

• The village was equipped with defensive facilities and had the ability to prevent attacks from external enemies.

   

• It is also believed that this is due to the need to defend the enemy.

• The presence of defensive facilities is evidence that the war has taken place,

   

• Among the human bones excavated in the Yayoi period, there are also those with ashes, bronze swords and bronze pots.

   

   

• Lifestyle and culture were all about food.

   

• Yayoi-style pottery is characterized by a large ceramic bowl that exceeds 30 cm in height.

   

• Yayoi pottery was used for storing rice, cooking and stuffing, etc.

this line is hardly to understand.

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このような集落は環濠集落と呼ばれています。

A village like this is called a ring village.

now have sense.

https://tyottojuku.com/study/日本史/水稲農業の開始と社会生活の進展/2551/

the central building is the storehouse or warehouse.

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

The navy comes from China and Korea.

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Ships were developed and used since the Three Kingdoms of Korea period. Because of the abundance of coastal waters surrounding the Korean peninsula, Koreans developed simple fishing ships to take advantage of the resources.

Baekje, one of the kingdoms, first began expanding its navy and trading products by sea. Baekje also provided the link to spread Buddhism and Korean and Chinese culture to Japan. However, with the rise of Goguryeo's power and Gwanggeto the Great, Baekje's navy was soon defeated near the end of the 4th century^[4] Goguryeo also repelled numerous Chinese naval forces during its wars with China. During the Goguryeo-Sui Wars, Goguryeo defeated an invading Chinese fleet in 598, in the Bohai Sea.

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Model ship, haniwa ritual pottery, Japan. Japanese Civilisation, Kofun period, 3rd-6th century.

 

Haniwa art - Jomon boat.

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Model ship, haniwa ritual pottery, Japan. Japanese Civilisation, Kofun period, 3rd-6th century.

 

 

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Drawings of the haniwa pottery incised pictures of the “boat of the dead” from the early 4th century Higashi Tonozuka Kofun, Nakayama-cho, Tenri city, Nara prefecture

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The Haniwa (埴輪) are terracotta clay^[2][3] figures that were made for ritual use and buried with the dead as funerary objects during the Kofun period (3rd to 6th centuries AD) of the history of Japan. Haniwa were created according to the wazumi technique, in which mounds of coiled clay were built up to shape the figure, layer by layer.^[

 

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An Ancient Ship Reborn: Kofun Period (1,800–1,500 years ago)

Based on a line drawing engraved in wood at the ruins of Tajima showing a fleet from the Kofun Period, we have recreated an ancient ship at full scale. It vividly illustrates what sea travel to and from the Asian continent must have been like in those days.

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

Religion.

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The religion practiced by the Yayoi people was a form of animism and nature worship with no clear distinction between divine and human and nature and divinity. The Yayoi people buried their dead after a mourning period and purification rituals in conical pots or in shallow pits with wooden coffins covered with slabs of stone. They practiced divination using baked deer bones or tortoise shells.

 Aileen Kawagoe wrote in Heritage of Japan: “Many ritual objects from the Yayoi period such as bronze bells, bronze weapons, bronze mirrors and stone maces have been discovered buried at various sites in Japan. But it is only recently, that archaeologists have been able to understand how the ritual objects might have been used during the Yayoi period. As rice-farming or rice agriculture was introduced by immigrants into Yayoi Japan, new rituals and ritual accessories associated with agriculture too appeared on the scene. The Yayoi people performed rituals to invite or appease their local deities. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “Bronze bells (called dotaku in Japanese) were important ritual objects used in connection with agricultural festivals and ceremonial rituals. Rice-farming scenes engraved on bronze bells and pottery shards show people pounding rice and elevated granaries used to store rice. The Yayoi people are believed to have used the bronze bells or dotaku during ceremonies to summon or invite the deities most important to their survival: the spirits of the rice, land (hunting), and perhaps also the spirits of their ancestors. During a Mahan ritual on the Korean continent, bronze bells were hung from a tree and rung by striking the iron clapper on the inside of the bell. Ritual bronze bells in Japan are widely supposed to have been used in a similar way." 

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According to “Topics in Japanese Cultural History”: Agriculture was the foundation of all economic activity in Japan until the start of this century. The most important kami, therefore, were those associated with agriculture. In many localities during the Tomb period and later, villagers worshiped a pair of kami, one male and the other female. The thinking was that the fertility of these kami was closely connected with the fertility of the land and that such worship would help ensure a bountiful harvest. Sexual imagery in the form of depictions of male and female organs, often carved out of stone, was common in such worship. This imagery is still seen in numerous local festivals, although with the diminished importance of agriculture, religious depictions of sexual organs today are often regarded as aids for couples trying to conceive. [Source: “Topics in Japanese Cultural History” by Gregory Smits, Penn State University figal-sensei.org *~*]

 “The leaders of locally powerful clans worshiped these agricultural deities since the livelihood of everyone in the area depended on good harvests. In time, many of these clans (uji) came to regard these agricultural deities as their ancestral founders. Local agricultural deities, in other words, became the ujigami (uji-founding kami) of the major local clans. As the confederation of clans in the Yamato area extended its hegemony over the other uji and peoples of the Japanese islands, their ujigami became more widely known. *~*

 “Of particular importance, of course, was the Yamato royal family, whose ujigami was Amaterasu, a female solar deity (often called the "sun goddess"). Her "deity-body" (shintai--an object in which the kami spirit is thought to inhere) is housed at the inner shrine at Ise, near the coast of the old Yamato region. Worship of Amaterasu was an important duty of the Yamato king, who was as much a religious leader as he was a secular leader. After the Taika Reforms of 645, Amaterasu became, at least in theory, a kami of great importance for all of the Japanese islands. *~*

 “Moving a few centuries back in time to the early tomb period, religious life seems to have been dominated by women with special spiritual powers. These women functioned as shamans and were often political leaders as well. Female leadership in religious and political life was common throughout many parts of East Asia prior to the spread of Confucianism and Buddhism. In Ryukyu, for example, female shamans (noro in Japanese; nuru in Okinawan) played a major role in local religious and political life until this century. The head priestess of Ryukyu (Kikoe-Ogimi) was nearly as powerful as the king until the seventeenth century. In Japan, by the time of the Taika Reforms, female shamans no longer played a role in the official state religious ceremonies. A few centuries earlier, however, female shamans sometimes served as leaders of the Yamato Kingdom." *~*

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Kawagoe wrote: “Animals pictured on the bronze bells include: deer, fish, birds, wild boar, dragonflies, frogs, lizards, turtles, dogs, snakes, mantises, spiders and crabs. These animals likely represented local deities that were being worshipped and appeased by Yayoi people at the time. Deer and birds (herons and cranes) appeared the most times in Yayoi bronze bell art, and are thought to be especially important grain deities connected with the cyclic activity of agricultural life. Around 200 pictures of deer carved on Yayoi pottery were also discovered. (Deer appeared far many more times than wild boar on most of their bells … even though the Yayoi people preferred eating wild boar to deer...Archaeologists have concluded that deer represented the life-giving spirits of the land, herons and cranes spirits of rice, and the human images, their ancestors by studying ancient Japanese documents and examples of folk customs as well as animal habitats. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website,heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “Experts believe the Yayoi people worshipped an important deer deity and they practised a magical ritual of sowing seeds in deer blood that they believed would speed up the germination of rice plants. They believed that the deer's life force helped in the growth of rice. Since antlers were shed on a yearly cycle, the deer likely symbolized regeneration, growth and decay which the people associated with the growth cycle of plants. According to an ancient 8th century legend from the Nara period, rice that has been planted in the fresh blood of a deer germinates mysteriously overnight. The myth related to spring rice-planting rituals, is recorded in the “Local Record of Harima Province” (“Harima no kuni Fudoki“). <^>

 “Cranes and herons were probably sacred birds to the Yayoi people. Wooden birds attached to wooden poles have been found at a number of excavated Yayoi sites. The sacred bird is thought to be symbolic of the rice spirit bird that brought the first rice seeds to man in its beak. Experts believe there was a yearly ceremony performed when the Yayoi priests would don bird plume outfits, board a boat and go out to meet and call the birds (i.e. bird spirit) back. Engravings of boats and feathered priests are known from a number of pottery vessels such as the one found on a pottery jar dated to the Middle Yayoi period from Inayoshi, Tottori prefecture. What was the role of the feathered shaman priests depicted on the pottery and was the boat was a mock one or did the shaman priests actually get into real boats that were cast out to water." <^>

 

Divinization, Magic and Shamanism in Yayoi Japan

 

 Kawagoe wrote: “Seasonal agricultural and magical rites and ceremonies were performed by the Yayoi people, like the Jomon people who came before them. They left behind many signs of their rituals. The bronze bells and mirrors were used in their ritual ceremonies as were stone halberds and stone swords and other such ritual tools. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 The Chinese account Wajinden mentions that the people of Wa during a time of civil unrest had enthroned Himiko as their queen. Queen Himiko, records the Wajinden, was a shaman priestess who governed, controlled and captivated the minds and loyalties of her people through divine spiritualism, magic and sorcery. She was shrouded in an air of secrecy, mystiscism and asceticism. Nobody saw her except the lone male servant who had access to her for the purpose of serving her meals and being her spokesman and messenger. Wajinden recorded that 1,000 maids served her willingly." <^>

 An etching of what is thought to be a shaman has been found on a Yayoi pottery shard “Shamanism involves ecstasy and trances, and provides shamanic followers with a source of inspiration in times of need. Shamans have the roles of go-between mediums, revealing the will of the gods; as prophetesses, seers or readers of divine oracles; soothsayer, fortune teller, medicine man, procurers of good fortune and as such whose services were especially needed in times of wars, famines, and other social crises. <^>

 “Divination or scapulimancy – the practice of divination by burning scapulae (shoulder bones) usually that of deer (tortoises were occasionally used). An oracle would probably have been delivered by reading the heat cracks, scratches and lines. More than 100 oracle burnt bones excavated at 25 Yayoi sites throughout Japan are evidence of this practice. The Chinese Wei Zhi chronicle records the reasons behind the practices of the Yayoi people as thus: “Whenever they undertake an enterprise and discussion arises, they bake bones and divine in order to tell whether fortune will be good or bad. First they announce the object of divination, using the same manner of speech as in tortoise shell divination; then they examine the cracks made by the fire and tell what is to come to pass." <^>

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Yayoi Period Japanese may have used “magic mirrors” to conjure up images of mountain wizards and divine beasts for sun-worshipping rituals, scientists at Kyoto Nation Museum said in January 2014. Tsuyoshi Sato wrote in the Asahi Shimbun, “The Kyoto National Museum said patterns engraved on the back of a type of bronze mirror associated with ancient queen Himiko are projected on a wall when sunlight reflects off the front. Ryu Murakami, head of the museum's curatorial board, said the discovery could provide valuable clues in studying how bronze mirrors were used in ancient Japan. “Someone apparently noticed the phenomenon and intentionally shaped mirrors in this way," he said. “I believe they have something to do with sun worship." [Source: Tsuyoshi Sato, Asahi Shimbun, January 30, 2014 /=/]

 “Using a 3-D printer, Murakami, an expert in historical materials science, produced replicas of two Sankakubuchi Shinjukyo mirrors from materials used in the originals, such as copper and tin powder. The mirrors, 21 and 24 centimeters in diameter, were found in the Higashinomiya tomb in Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture, and are owned by the Kyoto National Museum. The Sankakubuchi Shinjukyo mirror, believed to be produced around the third century, is characterized by its triangular rim when seen in cross-section. Its back features a relief engraving of wizards and mythical creatures. /=/

 “More than 500 mirrors have been unearthed in areas from the northeastern Tohoku region to the southern island of Kyushu, with many in the Kinki region. The mirror is associated with Himiko because some were inscribed with the year 239, when a Chinese emperor presented 100 bronze mirrors to the queen's emissary, according to a Chinese chronicle. Some ancient Chinese mirrors are known to function as magic mirrors." But the Kyoto National Museum “announcement was the first to confirm similar properties in an ancient mirror excavated in Japan. /=/

 “In a magic mirror, unevenness on the polished surface—too subtle to be detected by the naked eye—reproduces patterns on the back when sunlight reflects off the front. Minute concavities and convexities that mirror the backside designs are created during the polishing process. The concave parts focus light, while convex parts diffuse light, resulting in the projected image. Murakami has yet to confirm whether other types of bronze mirrors work like a magic mirror, but he believes that other Sankakubuchi Shinjukyo mirrors have similar projective qualities if substantial differences exist in the metal's thickness. /=/

 “Shoji Morishita, an associate professor of archaeology at Otemae University's faculty of cultural and historical studies, said researchers tended to focus on the back of bronze mirrors, but cutting-edge technologies have shed new light on the mirrors. “The finding could lead to reconsideration of the role of mirrors in ancient rituals," said Morishita, who is well versed in bronze mirrors. “Sometimes, dozens of mirrors are found from the same burial mound. Theoretically, it's not hard to imagine that they were lined up to project a number of images."“ <^>

Spoiler

similar to LoZ Twilight Princess mirror.

...

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Kawagoe wrote: Archaeologists have found different kinds of burials from excavation sites around Japan. The burial culture of the Yayoi period showed a change from the earlier Jomon burial rituals in that it was the beginning of large-scale formal cemeteries. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com<^>]

 Charles T. Keally wrote: “Not far from the village was a burial ground. The most common and wide-spread form of burial was a small trench in the middle of an area enclosed by a square ditch (moat). The area enclosed was anywhere from a few meters on a side up to 20 or 30 meters across. Low mounds covered the burials in the center. There is little doubt that these are the precursors of the later Kofun period mound tombs. The jar and cist burials usually pictured as representative of Yayoi burials are in fact mostly limited to a small region of northern Kyushu and not representative at all. [Source: Charles T. Keally, Professor of Archaeology and Anthropology (retired), Sophia University, Tokyo, net.ne.jp/~keally/yayoi ++]

 “Burials under low mounds in enclosures surrounded by a ditch (moat) were common everywhere in Yayoi Japan. Most enclosures were square, but many late ones were round. By the 3rd century in the Kansai District, a number of new forms appeared, and one, the keyhole shape, is thought to be associated with the Yamato central power. The keyhole-shaped mound tombs define the boundary between the Yayoi and Kofun periods archaeologically, but in fact the differences in the common culture for a century on either side of this boundary are largely insignificant." ++

Most burial jars of ordinary graves, and there were hundreds and even thousands of such jars at some Yayoi cemetery sites, contained no grave goods. However, a number of remarkable finds of grave goods have been found: Bronze mirrors were the most valuable of grave goods marking the grave of a very high-ranking person. The Hirabaru mound site had 39 bronze mirrors; the Mikumo-minami-shoji burial no. 1 site had 35 mirrors; Suku-okamoto site 32 mirrors; Mikumo-minami-shoji burial no. 2 site 22 mirrors; and Ihara-yarimizo site had 21 mirrors. <^>

 “Glass beads from burials were analysed by scientists and found to have been lead-barium glass of the kind found in the pre-Han period in China. Such glass bead items, known as pi, were likely to have been objects of trade between Yayoi Japan and China. At the Yamamoto site in eastern Japan, 68 glass beads were recovered from the burial mound, along with pottery. <^>

 “Hirabaru mound had turned up some of the largest finds of glass beads: 480 dark blue globular beads; 10-12 cylindrical glass beads; 17-18 “bone-like” cylindrical beads; 12 cylindrical agate beads forming a bracelet; 1 amber-opal earring and 500 amber-opal beads; 320 rings of deep blue joined glass beads that made up a necklace; and three blue curved glass beads (magatama) uncommonly perforated on both sides. Agate beads and amber-opal beads were unknown in Yayoi Japan, and most likely arrived as trade items from Han period sites in China or from the Chinese outpost of Lolang in Korea. Shell bracelets were found in a burial jar of a female from the large communal cemetery of the Yoshinogari settlement alongside with a bronze mirror. The shells bracelets were made out of cone shells from the south seas. The female skeleton was thought to have belonged to a female shaman priestess." <^>

 

Burial Mounds at Yoshinogari

 

Kitafunkyubo (Northern Burial Mounds) at Yoshinogari, a Yayoi site in the outhern Japanese island of Kyushu, is thought to have been the final resting places of successive generations of Yoshinogari rulers. Located here are artificial mounds, very strong in structure, made up of layers of different kinds of soil. Fourteen burial jars were found in the mounds. One of them contained glass beads and an elaborately-designed bronze sword. These burial mounds were made and used in the middle Yayoi period around 1 B.C. The area was not used as a cemetery afterward, perhaps because it was believed to have been a resting place of ancestral spirits. [Source: Yoshinogari Historical Park yoshinogari.jp <=>]

The Prayer Hall here is believed to have been where people said prayers and made offerings to ancestral spirits resting in the mounds. The tall pole in front of the northern burial mounds is called Ricchu, or Column. It seems to have been a symbolic pole, marking where ancestral souls rested. A tomb path at the site is believed to have been used by people visited the burial mounds to worship souls of ancestors. <=>

Some funerary goods were found in one of the 14 burial jars. Although a grip of a regular bronze sword is made of wood, the sword found here was made entirely of bronze, which is very unusual. Raw materials of the beads cam from China. It is not clear however whether the beads were made in Japan or China, or even somewhere else. Such valuable grave goods indicates the man buried there was person of high status. <=>

The unglazed burial jars at Yoshinogari are of a distinctive type found only in the northern part of Kyushu. The body was bent to fit into the jar and then the jar was buried in the ground. This type of burial was common for about 200 years, during the middle of the Yayoi period. There are two types of burial jars at Yoshinogari. One is a two-piece jar divided in the middle that could be open, making is easier to place the body inside. The other is a simple jar covered with a big, flat-stone lid. Although differences in how the jars were used has not been determined, scholars speculate it probably had something to do with differences in social standing. <=>

Approximately 15,000 jars are believed to have been buried in mounds in Yoshinogari. Among them, over 2,000 jars are buried in a 600-meter long row on both sides of the path in the middle of the northern mounds. (The path is thought to have been a way to visit the graves or a line to separate them by ranks.) People at the time seem to have paid homage to the deceased. <=>

 

Yoshinogari Burial Practices

 

 Noblemen and ordinary people alike were buried in ceramic jars comprised of two jars placed with their open ends together and sealed. When a person was buried a pit was dug and one earthen jar was placed in the side of the pit, the body with legs bent was placed inside and the other jar was attached in such a way that it extended into the pit, which was then filled in. Noblemen were buried with distinctive bronze daggers.

 Kawagoe wrote: “At the Yoshinogari burial mound site, the people would proceed from the mound along a passageway ending at a pair of postholes which are thought to be tori gates. In front of this gate is a large pit filled pottery. Traces of fire found here suggest fires were lit here, as food offerings contained in the pottery were made to ancestors by family members or tribal members. The passageway and tori gates are thought to have been the earliest examples of the Shinto gate. (According to the Japanese religion, the pilgrim on his way to a Shinto shrine to worship his ancestors also has to pass a torii, a Shinto gate.) [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “Funerals and rites for the dead appeared to have been important and elaborate to the villagers, especially where members of the village of an elite status were concerned. In an area quite separate from the communal cemetery for commoners, a 30 by 40 meter mound was constructed where the village chiefs and leaders were buried. Five of the six jars found in the centre of the mound contained cylindrical jade-like glass ornaments from China as well as bronze daggers that came from the Korean peninsula. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “For the commoners, they built a cemetery containing long rows of jar burials. About 2,000 burial jars, have been found both inside and outside the ditches. Inside one of these jars with a stone lid, buried with a female body, was discovered a finely-made bronze mirror (7.4 centimeters in diameter with a pattern of interconnected arcs and a eight-character inscription) in the renkomon style of the Early Han Dynasty period). The female had been buried in silk clothes and wearing 25 shell bracelets on her right arm and eleven bracelets on the left. The shell bracelets were exotic items, made from cone shells from the south seas and must have shone beautifully like pearls when they were first worn. Other items excavated from Yoshinogari include Japanese-style bronze mirrors, coins, bells, halberds, iron tools and wooden tools." <^>

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...

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Yayoi Boat-Shaped Coffins

 

 Boat-shaped coffins have been found Yayoi Period tombs. It is thought that these coffins were made to ferry the deceased to the after-life. The oldest boat-shaped wooden coffin, dated to be around 2000 year old, in the middle of the Yayoi period. world, was found by construction workers while preparing to build a new hospital in the Kita Ward of Nagoya. This boat-shaped wooden coffin is approximately 200 years older than any previously found. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website,heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 Another large boat-shaped coffin was found in the tomb of the Ohoburo Minami Kofun-gun in Northern Kyoto, dated to the latter half of the Yayoi Period (4 B.C."4 A.D.), containing various precious grave goods, including a beautiful cobalt blue glass bangle, an iron bangle and many iron swords. [Source: Mainichi Shimbun, February 21, 2009, A Journey for Tango Kingdoms, The Tango Tour Guide website <^>]

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 Following the Yayoi Period, the Kofun Period saw funerary boat haniwa in common use surrounding keyhole shaped tombs, and the famous tomb painting of a boat, along with representation of the sun, moon and birds resting on the boat, from the Mezurashizuka Kofun in @#&#036;%uoka, suggests that boats of the dead ritual symbolism was significant to people of those times. [Source: A Witness to History, National Museum of History website, <^>]

 Many other cultures in Southeast Asia also buried their dead in boat-shaped coffins, namely, the Xiaohe culture in Xinjiang; the Bo people (Sichuan) and Ba and related Tujia peoples of China; Minyue culture (Wuyi mountains, Fujian); the Dongson culture, Vietnam; Niah caves, Borneo. The Japanese boat-shaped coffin relics may indicate incoming migrants from one of these cultures in Southeast Asia, particularly Austronesian cultures. The coffins at the Xiaohe Tombs were buried in five levels, each coffin resembling an upside'down ship on the shore with the dead buried within. Live cows had been killed at the burial and their skins were used to wrap the coffins. As the skins dried and shrank, the coffins were bound increasingly tighter. [Source: Epoch Times]

 Image Sources: Wikimedia Commons; National Museum of Science, Tokyo kahaku.go.jp; Yoshinogari Historical Park yoshinogari.jp.

Text Sources: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>; Charles T. Keally, Professor of Archaeology and Anthropology (retired), Sophia University, Tokyo, figal-sensei.org *~*; Asia for Educators Columbia University, Primary Sources with DBQs, afe.easia.columbia.edu ; Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan; Library of Congress; Japan National Tourist Organization (JNTO); New York Times; Washington Post; Los Angeles Times; Daily Yomiuri; Japan News; Times of London; National Geographic; The New Yorker; Reuters; Associated Press; Lonely Planet Guides; Compton's Encyclopedia and various books and other publications. Many sources are cited at the end of the facts for which they are used.

 

Wonder of the world?

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Yayoi Period Tumuli and Burial Mounds

 

 Kawagoe wrote: “From the middle Yayoi to the early Yamato period, rather large mounds (funkyubo) were being constructed on hills or knolls from a zone extending from Chugoku to Shikoku in the west to the Kanto plain in the northeast. These were either square in shape and surrounded by moats and ditches, similar to those found in China and north Asia. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “Before keyhole shaped mounds became the standard, a wide variety of mounds of differing shapes and sizes could be found all over Japan. These can be classed into the main types: 1) empun: round tomb mound; 2) zempo koen fun: front-square and rear-round tomb mound; 3) zempo koho fun: front-square and rear-square tomb mound; 4) hofun: square tomb mound. <^>

 “By the late Yayoi period however, some mounds became larger (between 40 to 80 meters long) and a few of the late 3rd century mounds are known to have evolved the keyhole shape (e.g. Hashihaka and Hokenoyama and Kurozuka mounds) similar to those typical of the later Yamato mounds. <^>

 Pre-Yamato mounds with haniwa clay tubes and stone cist burials have also been found at the Makimuku site in Sakurai (Nara Prefecture) and as far east as Ichihara in Chiba Prefecture. The early mounds were probably built at a stage for leaders who had brought several agricultural communities under their control but had not yet accumulated power and authority equal to that of a Yamato king. Round mounds present from the beginning of the period, served as burials for lower-ranking aristocrats. By early 6th century families of clan leaders were buried in round mounds in what were clan cemeteries clustered on hillsides.

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Pre-Yamato period mounds

From the middle Yayoi to the early Yamato period, rather large mounds (funkyubo) were being constructed on hills or knolls from a zone extending from Chugoku to Shikoku in the west to the Kanto plain in the northeast. These were either square in shape and surrounded by moats and ditches, similar to those found in China and north Asia.

Before keyhole shaped mounds became the standard, a wide variety of mounds of differing shapes and sizes could be found all over Japan. These can be classed into the main types:

1. empun: round tomb mound;
2. zempo koen fun: front-square and rear-round tomb mound;
3. zempo koho fun: front-square and rear-square tomb mound;
4. hofun: square tomb mound

By the late Yayoi period however, some mounds became larger (between 40 to 80 meters long) and a few of the late 3rd century mounds are known to have evolved the keyhole shape (e.g. Hashihaka and Hokenoyama and Kurozuka mounds) similar to those typical of the later Yamato mounds.

Pre-Yamato mounds with haniwa clay tubes and stone cist burials have also been found at the Makimuku site in Sakurai (Nara Prefecture) and as far east as Ichihara in Chiba Prefecture.

The early mounds were probably built at a stage for leaders who had brought several agricultural communities under their control but had not yet accumulated power and authority equal to that of a Yamato king.

Round mounds present from the beginning of the period, served as burials for lower-ranking aristocrats. By early 6th century families of clan leaders were buried in round mounds in what were clan cemeteries clustered on hillsides.

Keyhole shaped mounds become standardized

The famous large keyhole mounds did not appear until late Yayoi or the beginning of the Yamato period. The earliest among them emerged in the southwestern corner of the Yamato Basin near Mt Katsuragi and in the northeast at the foot of Mt Miwa.  Eventually they spread out along the Yamato River, and then to faraway corners of Japan such as Echizen, Izumo. Keyhole mounds in Kyushu (the largest of which are the Mesahozuka and Osahozuka mounds in the Saitobaru mound cluster) have been found as well, dating from the middle half of the 3rd century. The keyhole mounds were built in quick succession, often in lines or clusters, eventually becoming the standard sort of mound for the highest ranking rulers and kings.

Why were the mounds keyhole shaped? It is a matter of conjecture … one theory is that the shape looks like a horse’s hoof, more likely, the design evolved its “keyhole-shape” form after experimentation with various shapes.

The keyhole mounds also grew in size. This indicated that the workforce and number of labourers available had grown as well … either because of a burgeoning local population or because of a large influx of immigrant workers, or perhaps due to a combination of both. And the presence of increasingly larger tumuli indicated the presence of increasingly powerful rulers in the area.

Clay cylinders called haniwa were often half buried in the tomb surface encircling most of the tombs. While early haniwa were simple earthen cylinders, many of the later haniwa were sculpted into extremely artistic and aesthetically pleasing shapes and objects that tell us a lot about the kofun people and daily life.

Characteristic mounds of the Yamato kings – at the foot of Mt Miwa

In the Shiki area at the foot of Mt Miwa (in the southwestern corner of the Nara plainI, six mounds were built from AD 250 and 350: the Hashihaka mound (Sakurai); the Nishitonozuka (Tenri city); the Tobi Chausu-yama of Sakurai; the Mesuri-yama (Sakurai) and the Suijin tomb (Ando-yama, Tenri city) and the Keiko Tomb (Shibutani Muko-yama).

The  tombs…

• are exceptionally large (twice as large as any tomb found in Korea);
• were all built in quick succession, one after the other, in the Shiki area;
• contained impressive coffins made of split bamboo and pine and surrounded by lavish grave goods: large numbers of mirrors, weapons, tools and ornaments.

As such, these Mt Miwa tumuli have been identified as the tombs of powerful priest-kings kings, rulers of a new and expanding Yamato kingdom.

Burial facilities

Early on in the Kofun period, the deceased person was placed in a wooden coffin buried directly in the tomb summit, or in a pit lined with stone slabs, and then covered over with ceiling rocks. Later, stone coffins were used.

In the late Kofun period, stone chambers with horizontal entrance passages were constructed. This way, they could re-enter the chamber and add more burials of family members later.

At the end of the Kofun period, the culture of building massive kofuntumuli began to die out due to resources being diverted toward temple-building instead. Square mounds then became the preferred shape of mounds for the highest ranking aristocrats all over Japan. 

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

The land of Wa (Ancient Japan)

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The land of Wa is warm and mild. In winter as in summer the people live on vegetables and go about barefooted. Their houses have rooms; father and mother, elder and younger, sleep separately. They smear their bodies with pink and scarlet, just as the Chinese use powder. They serve meat on bamboo and wooden trays, helping themselves with their fingers.” Archaeologists have confirmed that the Yayoi people ate with their fingers since no chopsticks have ever been found from any excavated Yayoi settlements.

According to Wajinden, the people of Wa, were also “fond of diving into the water to get fish and shells.” They ate raw fish, hunted deer and wild boar for meat. They ate out of graceful and elegant pottery ware including new forms such as pedestaled dishes and bowls.

The men wear a band of cloth around their heads, exposing the top. Their clothing is fastened around the body with little sewing. The women wear their hair in loops. Their clothing is like an unlined coverlet and is worn by slipping the head through an opening in the center.”

Weaving is an ancient textile art and craft that involves placing two sets of threads or yarn called the warp and weft of the loom and turning them into cloth. (The earliest evidence of weaving in the world comes from the Czech Republic – impressions of textiles and basketry and nets on little pieces of hard clay, dating from 27,000 years ago but weaving was already known and practised by the Jomon people before the Yayoi era)

Wajinden mentioned that the Yayoi people cultivated “grains, rice, hemp, and mulberry trees for sericulture. They spin and weave and produce fine linen and silk fabrics.” They wove cloth 20-30 cm wide on looms. Scientists have been able to examine fragments of cloth wrapped around human bones and bronze mirrors from excavations. The Yayoi farmers grew the plants and trees from which they made their silk, linen, cotton and hemp. They also made fibre from wild ramie that had an S-twisted warp of 6-10 threads and a woof of 24 threads.

From excavating ancient Yayoi settlements, archaeologists get the picture that the Yayoi people lived in permanent farming villages, and that they constructed buildings of wood, thatch and stone. They accumulated wealth through land ownership and the storage of grain, traded in various goods, including rice, cloth, metals, salt, wooden tools and crafts, stone tools, ceremonial bronze mirrors, weapons and other commodities.

Those who were able to control the resources in Yayoi society became members of society with an elite status. They maintained their position and showed off their status by acquiring ceremonial goods that they considered prestigious like bronze mirrors and bronze weapons, the metal raw materials for which were hard to come by, and could only be got from the mainland. 

“There are no oxen, horses or sheep … Taxes are collected. There are granaries as well as markets in each province, where necessaries are exchanged under the supervision of Wa officials”… it was also recorded in the Wajinden account.

The Wei-Zhi (History of Wei) records that “Men, young and old, all tattoo their faces and decorate their bodies with designs”, and that “A son of the ruler of Shao-k’ang of Hsia when he was offered as lord of K’uai-chi, cut his hair and decorated his body with designs in order to avoid the attack of serpents and dragons.” From this account, it would appear that the practice of tattooing was not merely decorative but had a protective and spiritual function as well.   

The Yayoi people buried their dead, after a mourning period and purification rituals, in burial pits with wooden coffins or in burial jars. They were a religious and superstitious people, practising divination using baked deer bones or tortoise shells.

Rice farming spread from Kyushu eastwards and northwards to Shimane’s coastal plains and mountain valleys through two major routes: the “Sea of Japan” road along the Japan Sea coast and the “Mountain Road” over the Central Japan mountain ranges and the Yayoi village began to emerge in various regions.

The Yayoi farmers chose their rice field sites carefully. Initially, they preferred to choose not the swampy lowland locations that would be submerged by water most of the year, but high terraces or valleys backed by a hill or mountain were chosen. The Itatsuke site in Fu-ku-oka was a settlement on a high terrace encircled by an oval moat.

However, as rice farming spread, and more and more land was cleared for farming, the Yayoi farmers needed more territory and moved into the alluvial plains. The mountains that surrounded the valleys and alluvial plains separated communities from each other, so that over the era various chiefdoms consolidated their control in marked territorities (such as Yamatai, Yamato, Kibi, Tsukushi, Izumo, etc.) in geographically distinct regions or areas.

Immigrants must have arrived in northern Kyushu, in Japan from the Asian continent with their wet rice farming knowledge and advanced irrigation techniques at their beginning of the Yayoi period. This is clear because the technology did not show gradual innovations or advances but even the earliest Yayoi rice fields were already a complex system of canals, dams, paddy-field walls, and water intakes and outlets” to irrigate their fields. The immigrants had brought with them, new customs and traditions as well as their knowledge of how to make metal tools (iron and bronze). (While wet rice or paddy fields were cultivated and wet-rice agriculture flourished,  dry-field agriculture was practiced as well elsewhere in Japan.)

Wooden stakes were used to outline or divide the rice fields which were enclosed by embankments walled with wooden planks. The Yayoi villagers dug ditches that sometimes doubled as defensive moats. Canals were built to ensure a constant and controllable water supply system for irrigating the rice paddy. At Itatsuke, the canals had a dam for collecting water with an outlet for letting water into the rice field. Also amazing were the drainage canals that had been constructed under the rice fields so that the water could be recycled and channeled back into the rice fields.

The Yayoi farmers had learnt by the 3rd century A.D., that they could improve their rice yield by transplanting rice seedlings from seedbed into paddy field in orderly and weedable rows. When the farmers created new rice fields or built their waterways and canals, they worked closely and cooperated with one another.

They cultivated the fields with wooden rakes and hoes. The most common material used for making farming tools was hard oak wood. Stone hoes and reaping knives were used for harvesting rice. Some reaping knives were made of wood and shell but during the late Yayoi period, an iron edge was added to reaping knives made of wood.  Reaping knives were often used together with the crescent-shaped sickles used for cutting at the base of the entire rice stalk.

Few iron farming tools have been found, either because iron was still too scarce to be used for farming or because iron from the tools were constantly recycled and re-used. However, during the later part of the Yayoi period, iron tools began to replace stone ones. Iron provided sharper cutting edges so improving food production. The tools were durable and made tasks such as clearing of land for agriculture more efficient.

Other wooden tools such as eburi or paddy field smoothers, ooashi or paddy field trampers, paddy field sandals and others were found at the Toro site in Shizuoka prefecture. Other objects also found at the Toro included ground stone arrowheads, ground stone axes, spades, fire-making mortars, weaving looms, and small boats for rice fields. There were also stone sinkers for fishing nets and fish-hooks made of antler. Deer scapulae used for divination, indicated that the shaman religion played an important role in the society.

They harvested the rice and stored the rice in storage jars in underground storage pits or in elevated storehouses (similar to those in southern China). At excavated sites like the Toro Ruins, a Yayoi farming settlement located in a coastal plain in Shizuoka prefecture, pottery recovered consisted of storage jars, cooking jars, pedestalled dishes and serving bowls.

During the earliest Yayoi days, storage jars and a type of cooking pot that emerged in Kyushu and that had spread to southwestern Japan were clearly influenced by Korean mulmun plain pottery. But in other areas of Japan, Jomon styles of pottery modified or were incorporated into the Korean-influenced storage jars and cooking pots that were associated with agricultural uses.

Pottery of the Yayoi Period settlement in Yokohama

Besides rice, 37 kinds of cultivated plants were known to have been grown, including foxtail millet, adzuki beans and barley. However, rice was the most important food, a fact shown by the high percentage that was recovered from excavations compared to other cereals.

Wild boars were kept in the Yayoi village as during Jomon times. Archaeologists have also identified some excavated bones to be those of the domesticated pig, most certainly introduced from the mainland. The Yayoi people also continued to hunt animals and to fish, and gather wild roots, vegetables and fruit to supplement their rice-based diet.

 

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Yoshinogari

 

 Yoshinogari is the largest Yayoi settlement excavated in Japan. Located in the Kanzaki area of Saga Prefecture, it was the center of a small "nation state" and existed for approximately 600 years, roughly dovetailing with the Yayoi period. Relics found at the site, including copper/bronze knives and decorative glass beads, show the extremely high academic value of Yoshinogari. [Source: Yoshinogari Historical Park yoshinogari.jp <=>

 Structures at Yoshinogari include watchtowers, used to spot enemies and display the village's greatness; semi-subterranean pit dwellings, used as residences and workshops; and platform buildings, used for storage and as residences. The area with the largest buildings is believed to have been a sacred area, where priests lived and carried out rituals, and political leaders held meetings. Large separate areas are thought to have been a marketplaces and a place where ritual objects were made.

 It is difficult to determine the population of Yoshinogari. Based on the number of tombs and residences, environmental factor such as deforestation, and calculations on how much fuel wood was needed and how much food people ate, researchers determined that about 1,200 people lived inside the outer circular moat and about 5,400 lived in the Yoshinogari area at its peak.

 Yoshinogari is considered one of the ministates that prospered during the Yayoi Period. It was discovered in 1986 when the area was being surveyed for a housing development. Archaeological digs uncovered numerous holes from pillars of pit dwellings as well as what are believed to be watchtowers, ritual and storage sites, plus moats surrounding the village and burial mounds. About 2,500 burial pots of different sizes were also found, including 400 with human bones and some with jewelry, pieces of silk or hemp cloth and arrows. Yoshinogari was designated by the government as nationally protected historical remains in 1990 and special remains the following year. [Source: Japan Times, March 17, 1999]

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The early settlers built a moated settlement that was about 2.5 hectares in area. They built there a small number of pit houses, and surrounded their village with ditches. They dug storage pits and buried their dead there in burial jars. By the Middle Yayoi period, the village had expanded in size to about 20 hectares in area. The villagers must have become somewhat prosperous for they built large wooden raised-floor grain storage houses (or granaries) in the middle and southern areas of the site. The largest building was 12.5 meters by 12.5 meters with huge wooden posts 40-50 centimeters in diameter. <^>

 “The villagers also dedicated a special area of the village to crafts such as the casting of bronze objects and the making of pottery (of a kind that is similar to pottery found along the coastal areas of Korea). Archaeologists think that the villagers had strong contacts with Korean peninsula during this time perhaps in relation to interchanges with Korean bronze-casting specialists. <^>

 In the Late Yayoi Period (A.D. 1st century - 3rd century) Yoshinogari developed into the largest moated village in the country. At that time it was encircled by a large outer moat dug down in a "V" shape. The village featured two special inner areas (the "Northern Inner Enclosure" and the "Southern Inner Enclosure"). Large buildings appeared, particularly in the Northern Inner Enclosure. <=>

 Kawagoe wrote: “During the Late Yayoi period, the village had grown to an enormous 40 hectares. The defenses of the village had also been expanded, to completely surround the settlement and cemetery areas. Multiple defensive ditches were built, with the large outer ditch around the edges of the low hill and smaller ditches surrounding the pit houses and raised-floor buildings. There were even double ditches encircling the northern area. Palisades were built on the inside of the ditches." <^>

 Between end of the A.D. 3rd century and the beginning of 4th century, Yoshinogari was suddenly deserted. A few people remained. Evidence of a small village near Yoshinogari village has been found People from this village threw broken earthenware items into Yoshinogari's circular moats. It is not known why Yoshinogari was abandoned. 

 

Was Yoshinogari the Capital of the Japanese Kingdom of Yamato?

 

 Some scholars have argued that Yoshinogari was the capital of the ancient Yamato Kingdom — the kingdom that gave to imperial and modern Japan. Definitive proof of this has not been found, but the sites and structures discovered at Yoshinogari are similar to those described in the ancient Chinese chronicle "Gishi Wajinden" about the Yamato kingdom, In addition, the time period and location of Yoshinogari roughly corresponds in terms of both period and location with that of Yamato. <=>

 At Yoshinogari moated villages began appearing along with evidence that these villages were starting to unify into a primitive state in the early Yayoi period. In the middle Yayoi period a large circular moat was built around a large area that encompassed several villages and had a designated area where priests lived and high officials met. There were burial mounds for leaders and cemeteries filled with burial jars.

 In the late Yayoi period Yoshinogari was the largest known moated village in Japan, It was encircled by a large outer moats dug down in a “V” shape. Inside was special inner areas, some with very large buildings. The large outer moat was designed to protect the entire village from outside enemies; an inner moat inside protected a smaller area. The outer moat had a total length of 2.5 kilometers and encircles an area of more than 40 hectares, an area the size of 30 baseball fields.

 

Ties to China Unearthed from Yoshinogari Ruins

 

 In March 1999, the Japan Times reported: “Ever since their discovery was first announced in 1989, the Yoshinogari ruins, widely recognized in Japan as one of the oldest-known communities surrounded by moats, have been providing visitors information about ancient Japanese society. “I think we can say from the findings so far that whoever reigned here had enormous power and attracted people and commodities," said Tadaaki Shichida, 47, a Saga Prefectural Board of Education official and chief researcher of the ruins. “Some may even have come here to be protected from enemies." [Source: Japan Times, March 17, 1999 ***]

 “The Yayoi Period is generally considered to be the time when ancient Japanese took up rice farming, brought over from the Korean Peninsula. Findings from the Yoshinogari site indicate that a class society already existed at that time, he added. One of Yoshinogari's charms is its resemblance to Queen Himiko's legendary state of Yamatai that dominated Japan in the late second and early third centuries, as described in “Account of Wa People," a sixth-century Chinese chronicle. Whether the Yoshinogari ruins were the state described in the book has sparked controversy among experts and the media, and has made the site even more attractive to history buffs. Shichida admits many Yoshinogari findings have their origins in China and Korea. ***

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 “The circular settlements surrounded by moats at Yoshinogari are similar in structure to ancient Chinese castle walls, he said. Such structures with moats during this era are found at only 12 sites in Japan, and nine are from ancient ruins in Saga Prefecture including Yoshinogari. “This could be one indication that the area was closer to Chinese culture than anywhere else in this country," he said. Some findings from Yoshinogari also indicate the connections between this state and other parts of Japan. Last year, a type of bronze bell found in other parts of Japan was found in Kyushu for the first time at Yoshinogari. Other findings include moats that date back to a century before the beginning of the Yayoi Period. ***

 “Historians and archaeologists from China and Korea occasionally visit the ruins, giving Shichida and his colleagues the opportunity to exchange information and opinions. Shichida also visits these countries to research the relationship between Yoshinogari and the two cultures. “Archaeology is the history of people's communication," Shichida said." ***

 

Yayoi Architectural Styles

 

 Kawagoe wrote: During the Yayoi period (400B.C."300A.D.), several architectural advances were made in their buildings. The Yayoi people built many elevated buildings or buildings that were raised above the ground, with the buildings supported by six or seven posts. This advanced type of architecture — was built with wooden beams made of planks of a regular shape, with floors, doors and slanted supporting poles. A very sophisticated method called the mortise and tendon method was used to join the wooden beams, so experts think the people already had iron tools. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website,heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “The buildings with their raised floors, had ladders carved of a single piece of wood rather than utilizing separate rungs. They also had wooden discs that were protective devices against rats attached to the posts just under the floor as well as at the top of the entrance ladder, a design common in buildings in Southeast Asia. <^>

 “These elevated buildings were often used for shared communal functions — for excavated wooden tools were found to have been gathered and stored in one house probably for the collective use of the whole farming village. The raised floor buildings are thought to have functioned at first, mostly as warehouses or storehouses. <^>

 “Although the elevated building had first appeared during the Jomon period (particularly at large trading settlements like Sannai Maruyama), they were rare then, and only became common during the Yayoi period. Over time, however, the building style was adopted for residences of the elite and important persons of society. Other Yayoi architecturally advanced forms were the buildings that had irimoya thatched roofs that flared out at the sides. This flared roof style became the style for residences or palaces (miya) for shaman leaders, chiefs and other elite tribal members of society. <^>

 References and source readings: 1) Totman, Conrad (ed.), A History of Japan (Blackwell series) pps 41-43; 2) Inaba, Kazuya and Nakayama, Shigenobu, Japanese homes and lifestyles: an illustrated journey through history; 3) Nishi, Kazuo and Hozumi, Kazuo, What is Japanese architecture?; 4) Ancient Rice Paddies – Toro Ruins and Museums (Japan Navigator); 5) Yoshinogari Historical Park official website; 6) Rare remains of two mid-2nd century pit dwellings decorated with square clay tiles excavated from Ise site, in Moriyama, Shiga Prefecture.

 

Yayoi Houses

 

 
replica of Yayoi underground houseKawagoe wrote: Humbler dwellings were built over shallow pits like homes of the earlier Jomon period. However, unlike Jomon pit houses, many Yayoi buildings did not have indoor fireplaces and so must have been colder residences than those of the Jomon period. Pit houses were of two kinds: round pit houses (influenced by building styles in the Korean peninsula), and square pit houses with rounded off corners (continued in the Jomon tradition)."Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website,heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “At the Toro site in Shizuoka prefecture, twelve dwellings were excavated. They were not the usual pit-dwellings — though they looked like pit-dwellings, they were surface dwellings. That is, the dwellings were built on the surface instead of at subdiluvial level. A double skirting wall of 30 centimeters was first built around the building and then the space between the walls filled in with earth … this technique probably worked to keep out the damp. Technically, the dwelling was not a “pit” dwelling since the floor inside was at the same level as the outside ground area, but the basic idea of a sunken living area was the same. <^>

 “The shape was rectangular with rounded corners and measured 5-8 meters long inside the bank and 8-12 meters outside the bank so that there was an oval living area within. There was a sunken fireplace at the center with four posts round it sunk into the ground. A wooden plank had been replaced at the bottom of each post-hole to prevent sinking. Beams connected the posts at the top with rafters radiating from those beams to the ground. The roof was thatched with miscanthus or some other grass. <^>

 

Yayoi Defenses and Fortifications

 

 The main defenses at Yoshinogari were located at the east gate of the village. An earthen bridge was built over the outer moat at this location with a large gate protecting the inner area. Extending from both sides of the gate was a spiked wooden fence/wall. From the extent of the defenses, it is supposed that this village was extremely important and perhaps the residence of successive rulers of the area. Seven gates similar to the east gate were located on the outer moat fence. Sentries were probably posted at all of these entrances. Sentries are believed to be armed with shields for protection and long spears and/or bow and arrows. They also wore body armor made of wood.

 The outer defenses at Yoshinogari are believed to have consisted of an abatis and a spiked wooden fence to prevent enemies from entering. An abatis is a field fortification consisting of an obstacle such as a ditch or with the sharpened tops directed outwards, towards the enemy. The trees are usually interlaced or tied with wire.These defenses were also found on both sides of the Higashi entrance gate as well as both sides of the gates opening into important areas.

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Yayoi defenses

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 Watchtowers near the gates of Yoshinogari were high-floored structures found at the four protruding corners of the circular moats. They are believed to have been used as lookout posts for enemies and may have served as worshipping areas, an inferences drawn from their placement in the sacred Kitanaikaku ( Northern Inner Enclosure). Important areas were surrounded by double circular moats and spiked wooden walls. Kitanaikaku is believed to have been the most important place because of the spiked wooden walls and moats placed around it.

 Kawagoe wrote: As village settlements grew in size or became more crowded, they were often fortified and were erected in more strategic positions on higher ground than during Jomon times, sometimes over a hundred meters in altitude. One such fortified village located on a hilltop bluff location was Otsu village in Yokohama. At Tawaramoto Town in Nara prefecture, the Karako-Kagi ruins consists of a Yayoi era tower that is a two-storey building (12.5 meters high and 4 meters by 5 meters) The tower's four main pillars were constructed of cedar wood and were 50 centimeters in diameter. The tower had a thatched roof, held in place by logs that look like the spokes of a wheel. The outer walls were made of wickerwork while the inner walls were board-lined. Carved ladders gave access to the tower. Of great interest are the spiral decorations on the roof made of wisteria vine. Three wooden birds have been fixed on both the east and west sides of the reconstructed Tower based on the three reverse S-shaped lines on the roof of building image incised on pottery."Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

Rulers Area at Yoshinogari

 

 At Yoshinogari there is evidence of large residences for local chiefs and leaders and meeting and ceremonial halls. Minaminaikaku (Southern Inner Enclosure) is the part of Yoshinogari that contained the rulers' residence. This is believed to be where the successive rulers of Yoshinogari and the surrounding village rulers resided during the peak of the Yayoi civilization. Judging from the formidable defenses of this area, including the circular moats, fences, and watchtowers, this place is considered to be where the rulers of Yoshinogari could be found. In contrast to the other living areas of Yoshinogari, the high-floored houses, as well as various iron products found in the area, show the elevated status of their residents . [Source: Yoshinogari Historical Park yoshinogari.jp <=>]

The ruler's residences are found in northwest Minaminaikaku. This important area was surrounded by fences and walls. These high-floored pit dwellings are believed to have been the residences of Yoshinogari's ruler and his family and relatives. The Shukainoyakata (Meeting House) is a a large high-ceilinged structure located in front of the rulers house. It is thought that this was where the ruler and the ruling class leaders met and talked. In another area, surrounding a large field, are many pit dwellings believed to belong to the ruling class. <=>

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The first line of defense for the southern section of Minaminaikaku consisted of a large wooden gate, located between the two southern openings, an inner moat and raised dirt wall. Sentries are believed to have been posted here top to observe those seeking entrance. One pit dwelling is situated outside of the circular moat northwest of Minaminaikaku is different from structures inside moat, leading scholars to believe that it was a guard house. Four high-floored watchtowers are located in Minaminaikaku. They are found at the protruding sections of the inner moat, presumably to allow sentries to observe people entering the village. <=>

 

Kitanaikaku (Northern Inner Enclosure)

 

Kitanaikaku (Northern Inner Enclosure) is believed to have been the most important area in Yoshinogari and, perhaps, the state that surrounded it. It is here that the dates for rice planting and harvesting, seasonal festivals and ceremonies, and the largest market are thought to have been established. It is also where important meetings for matters of state are believed to have been held and where prayers were offered unto ancestors. During the Yayoi period, some scholars have suggested, when people could not come to agreement on important issues, a high priest or shaman, with the perceived ability to communicate with ancestors and gods, was asked to intervene, and decisions were made based in messages received from the ancestors and gods. [Source: Yoshinogari Historical Park yoshinogari.jp <=>]

The large, central building in Kitanaikaku is believed to have been a large shrine or sanctuary (the Main Shrine) where important meetings and ritual gatherings were held. On the second floor of this shrine, it is surmised, the ruler, leaders in Yoshinogari and heads of nearby villages gathered for important ritual ceremonies, On the third floor of the shrine people prayed to receive a revelations from ancestral spirits. Some scholars believe followers sent the message to the ruler and leaders waiting on the 2nd floor. <=>

Higashisaiden (the Eastern Sanctuary) is a high-floored structure believed to have been used for celebrations and rituals regarding solstices and solar observation. It is located on a direct line measuring the start of the summer solstice and the end of the winter solstice. The Saido (Purification House) is a high-floored building located between the east sanctuary and the Main Shrine. This structure is believed to have been used as a place of purification and dressing before ceremonies at the main shrine. Items used in the ceremonies were also thought to be stored here. <=>

Takayukajukyo (High-floored Residence) is a high-floored house almost a perfect square in shape. Located near the Main Shrine, it is believed to have been the residence of priests. The building was surrounded by a rope-like fence, suggesting it was a holy place, possibly used exclusively by priests. Takaiyukasouko (High-Floored Storehouse) is located near the Main Shrine. Sacred objects used in festivals and ceremonies and the burial jars were believed to be stored here. A high-ceilinged storehouse is thought to have been where rice for offerings and seed rice for the coming year are believed to have been stored. <=>

Yoshinogari

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Kitanaikaku is believed to have been the most important place in Yoshinogari based on its defenses, which included double circular moats and closely-spiked wooden walls. A key-shaped wall prevented outsiders from entering straight into the compound. This was a common feature of ancient Chinese walled cities, which shows the Chinese influence at Yoshinogari. A watchtower — a high-floored structure — is found at the four protruding corners of the circular moats. It is believed to have been used as an enemy lookout post and additionally to have had a purpose in worshipping the area, inferred from the sacred nature of the Northern Inner Enclosure. <=>

 

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http://factsanddetails.com/japan/cat16/sub105/entry-5620.html

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An example of how bronze whorl plaques may have been used, based on items found mounted on shields of the Kofun period

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These are believed to have been made in the Japanese archipelago. The purpose of their manufacture and manner of use are unknown, but there are Kofun period examples that were mounted on shields, and to date more that 80 such items have been found. Those recovered from the Sakura no baba site have a prong attached to the top, and are precious as the only examples of their kind. The fragment in the box of the photo fits the 1944 find.

The Kofun warriors

 

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

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Iron and Bronze Tools and Weapons from the Yayoi Period

 

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bronze swords from Korea

 Iron tools excavated from the Yayoi period include swords, halberds, arrowheads, axes, chisels, point planes, knives, spade-shoes, reaping knives, sickles, needles; and fish-hooks. The earliest excavated metal specimen was a flat iron axe made of high-grade forged steel from the Magarita site in @#&#036;%uoka prefecture (dated to the Initial Yayoi period) and the Saitoyama site (Early Yayoi period) also in @#&#036;%uoka prefecture. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website,heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 The 3rd century Chinese document “Wei-shu” written in the A.D. 3rd century recorded that the Wa (Japanese) actively sought iron, along with the Han and the Ye peoples, and used it as a medium of exchange, like money. Iron is thought to have been the most important item traded in Yayoi times. By the late Yayoi phase, iron had replaced stone as the choice material for tools throughout the main islands of Japan. Iron, it seems, was preferred to bronze because it was more useful in making practical items such as tools and weapons with sharp edges. Bronze was rarer than iron and. It produced a duller edge but was more malleable. Bronze items tended to be ceremonial objects and prestige goods. <^>

 “Most early Yayoi iron artefacts, were Chinese-style foundry-made iron were probably items of Chinese trade. A large number of wrought-iron plates, were very similar to those mass-produced by the Han iron industry have been found in Japan and are said to be imports from China. Several early iron axeheads from Kyushu closely resembling early Chinese cast-iron implement-caps are also said to have Chinese provenance." <^>

 

Metal Versus Stone Agricultural Tools in the Yayoi Period

 

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stone knife

 Kawagoe wrote: Among the first imports from mainland Asia were the large bi-facially beveled stone axes used for harvesting lumber. Other new items introduced from the peninsula: stone reaping knives, wooden rakes for preparing fields, farming spade and hoe, polished stone daggers and arrowheads (along with cylindrical beads and the raised granary warehouse) were previously unknown in the Japanese islands. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “Although the immigrants came with the knowledge of metallurgy techniques, metals were too scarce to be used as farming tools, so stone was still used with occasional iron tips for the tools. Quadrangular stone axes and flat plano-convex stone adze heads were used to make wooden farming implements, pestles and mortars, following the earlier Jomon tradition of stone tool-kits. By the end of the Yayoi period, nearly all stone tools had become extinct, a sign that they had been replaced by iron. Iron was a valuable material however, and was constantly recycled and remelted down for making new tools over the years. Hence, very few iron artefacts have been recovered from archaeological digs. <^>

 “Metal was a durable material especially useful for making tools for agriculture and warfare. Iron tools with sharp cutting edges could be produced making the work of reaping harvests, clearing forest undergrowth and cutting lumber more efficient." <^>

 

Impact of Metal on Yayoi Period Japan

 

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Sword template

 Kawagoe wrote:The introduction of metalworking produced one important improvement in Japanese daily life that we take for granted today. Iron needles were less clumsy than the Jomon bone and stone needles of yesteryear. Now, the privileged social classes could enjoy woven garments of silk and hemp that could be sewn together in more complicated fashions. Most common people, however, continued to wear the rougher textured and simpler clothes made of ramie … often merely woven cloth with a hole for the neck and tied with a sash at the waist. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “The above important metal technological innovations impacted society and changed the way of life rapidly on the Japanese islands. The control of the supply of iron or bronze resources created a special and elite status for those who controlled the resources. <^>

 “The need for Korean iron also set in motion a process of inter-regional conflict and local consolidation of central power that was to characterize the following Kofun Period as ruling “kings” of the Kinai region expanded their bases of power westward along the Inland Sea and northern Kyushu as well as made shifting political alliances with different kingdoms in the Korean peninsula." <^>

 

Early Iron in Japan: Imports or Locally-Made

 

 Donald B. Wagner, an expert of on the earliest use of iron in East Asia, wrote: “The general consensus among scholars appears to be that the earliest iron artefacts found in Japan are from the early Yayoi period; these earliest artefacts are imports, but by the late Yayoi period iron weapons and tools are being made locally (see e.g. Kubota 1986; Yoshimura & Barnes n.d.). The same question is relevant here as in Korea: was the raw material for these locally-produced iron artefacts produced locally or imported? [Source: Early iron in China, Korea and Japan Roundtable discussion notes by Donald B. Wagner author of The earliest use of iron in China; Iron in Ancient China, The Jade Road website *|*]

 “A large number of wrought-iron plates, very similar to those mass-produced by the Han iron industry (see above), have been found in Japan. These are listed by Li Jinghua (1992: 109), who proposes that they are imports from China. I agree with him that this is the most likely explanation for these artefacts. *|*

 Hashiguchi Tatsuya (1992: 99-100) reproduces diagrams of two iron-production sites in Kyushu, but gives no explanation. One of these, his figure 1, excavated in @#&#036;%uoka, is fascinating, for it appears to show an odd type of bloomery which might be an early ancestor of the traditional Japanese tatara furnace (on which see e.g. Rostoker et al. 1989). It is dated to a time between the late Kofun and the late Nara period. If this is indeed a bloomery it is the earliest I know of from anywhere in East Asia. It shows that bloomeries were in use in early times in the Korea-Japan area, and my guess is that the bloomery iron-production technology was learned from Siberia rather than from China. Its peculiar construction may have been developed in Korea or Japan in response to the technical problems caused by the use of ironsand ore; such problems have been observed in eighteenth-century American bloomeries (Horne 1773) and in twentieth-century Chinese traditional “dwarf” blast furnaces (Wagner 1985: 17, 38, 55, 57). *|*

 “Hashiguchi (1992: 101) also illustrates several early iron axeheads from Kyushu. Some of these closely resemble early Chinese cast-iron implement-caps, while others are obviously of wrought iron. The former he takes to be imports, the latter local products, and I would agree. There is however a peculiar problem here: in each of the “cast iron” axeheads, at the socket end, there is a gap which Li Jinghua (1992) takes to be a sign that these artefacts actually are of wrought iron, and he therefore suggests that they are local wrought-iron imitations of imported Chinese cast-iron axeheads. In Hashiguchi's sketches these artefacts look very much like cast iron, and it would have required great skill on the part of the smith to imitate the cast implements so closely. The gaps in these artefacts may be cracks which occurred in the casting process: somewhat similar cracks are seen occasionally in ancient Chinese cast-iron artefacts (e.g. Mancheng, 1980: 280-281, pl. 197.1). In modern times, when white cast iron is cast, in order to avoid such cracks, the core of the mould is normally made of a material which is crushable and does not resist the shrinkage of the casting during solidification. In ancient China this type of artefact was often cast in cast-iron moulds with cast-iron cores, and cracking during solidification can be expected to have been a common phenomenon. Examination of the artefacts from Kyushu should solve this problem very quickly." *|*

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Yayoi spear

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Where Did the Iron Come From? China or Korea

 

 Kawagoe wrote: Because the 3rd century Chinese document “Wei-shu” reports that iron resources were found in southern Korea, iron technology and the supply of iron were once thought to have to have come to Japan from the Korean peninsula alone which had begun iron production under the influence of the Yen culture of the Chinese Warring States and possibly also under Siberian influences from the Tuman River Basin. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 The role of the Korean peninsula at the time as a source of iron is recorded in the Chinese histories such as Sanguo ji:“Pyonhan produces iron. Han, Ye and Ancient Japan [Wa] all come to buy it. Iron is used for buying and selling and Pyonhan also supplies iron to the two Chinese commanderies of Lelang and Daifang." <^>

 “According to Korean scholars, “At the time, the Japanese did not possess the skills to produce iron and thus imported iron from Korea's southern regions to make iron implements. Among the Samhan states, Guya (present-day Gimhae) was the center of iron production. According to the articles on Byeonhan in the Book of Wei of the Records of the Three Kingdoms, Guya sold iron to the rest of Samhan, as well as to Dongye, Nangnang and the Japanese states, and that iron was also used as currency." <^>

 “Excavations have shown extensive trade of iron in various forms between Japan and the mainland. The great demand for iron and the need for access to iron sources from Yayoi times has been a determining factor in many of the key political and military events in Japan during the Kofun and Yamato years." <^>

 

Where Did the Metal Technology Come From? China, Korea or Russia

 

 Kawagoe wrote: Many iron objects, both weapons and tools, from the tombs of this period have been discovered but experts find it difficult to tell whether they are Chinese or Korean products. The Chinese records suggest that iron technology was introduced from China into Korea through the establishment of Chinese commanderies in the north of the Korean peninsula. And until recently, most experts believed that ironworking in East Asia was introduced via that route at least before the 4th century B.C. since full-scale usage of ironware was seen in China. Chinese iron technology was already advanced by this time — China's oldest excavated iron foundries on the Yangtze River date to the 7th century B.C. In May of 2003 archeologists found the first relics of an iron casting workshop along the Yangtze River, dating back to the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (770 BC-256 B.C.) and the Qin Dynasty (221 -207 B.C.). [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “Some scholars, on the other hand, believe that development of iron technology was indigenous — since it happened at the same time both in the north and south of Korea before the establishment of the commanderies, beginning around the time of the founding of the Chosun state. The Han Chinese had attacked Chosun as part of its expansionist policy and in its search for more sources of salt and iron. <^>

 Archaeologists have recently discovered another source of Korean ironworking technology apart from the Chinese one. Russian archaeologists as well, have maintained that iron technology came into central Asia at a relatively early time, when the inhabitants began to use ironware without first passing through the Bronze Age. Recent events have clarified the history of iron technology: In 2007, 2000 artifacts were excavated from the Barabash-3 settlement site, including earthen vessels and nine iron artifacts, such as an ax and an arrowhead. (Barabash village is 70 kilometers away from the border between Korea and Russia in a direction of Vladivostok.) <^>

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Korean smelting

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 “Among those artifacts, the excavated ironware is made of gray cast iron, which predates the Chinese ironwork by 2 to 3 centuries. Scholars of the history of iron technology had previously believed that cast iron first appeared in China as gray iron. (Gray iron, which is made by adding graphite, requires more sophisticated technology than white iron.) This technology first appeared during the 2nd century B.C. in China and had spread all over the country by the 1st century B.C. <^>

 “Archaeologists have recently finished excavating at Barabash an iron manufacturing workshop from sometime between the 7th and 5th centuries B.C. Nearby the prehistoric iron manufacturing site, artifacts from the Bohai(or Parhae) culture related to those in the Korean peninsula were discovered in two places. The experts found when examining the iron relics, that stone axes had already been replaced by iron axes at this period. Archaeologists also uncovered a crescent-shaped stone knife, a relic that marks the rice-growing culture on Korean peninsula. There were signs at recently excavated site that the workers destroyed on purpose their iron manufacturing workshop when they migrated elsewhere. <^>

 “While Chinese records stated that Japan bought iron from Pyonhan in southern Korea, it is now believed that iron and iron technology of early Japan may also have been of Chinese provenance and some, possibly Siberian (Central Asian) provenance. Two iron-production sites excavated in Kyushu, including the find of one of the earliest bloomeries found in East Asia, suggest a Siberian provenance for the technology." <^>

 

Early Metallurgy in Japan and Problems Dating the Yayoi Period

 

 Kawagoe wrote: Most sources cite Initial Yayoi or Early Yayoi dates for the influx of the earliest iron into Japan, however, the National Institute for Cultural Properties in Nara's Shoda Shinya states that both the early 1st millenium B.C. dates of the northern part of the Korean Peninsula as well as the Japanese Early Yayoi Period chronologies are unreliable and need to be set back to younger dates, the latter to the Middle Yayoi period. Shoda is of the view that only the AMS C14-based dates in South Korean sites are sound. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 Archaeologist Charles T. Keally explains the radiocarbon dating controversy differently and backs the radiocarbon ages of the Yayoi artefacts: “In Japan, the oldest generally accepted evidence of iron use comes from the Magarita site in @#&#036;%uoka Prefecture (Hayamaru Yayoi 2003). This iron was found with Yuusu I pottery of the Earliest Yayoi period, giving it a simple radiocarbon age of about 700 B.C. or older (see Harunari et al. 2003). This date is 200-300 years older than the 4th-5th century B.C. that archaeologists give for the beginning of Yayoi. Even the dates available before 2003 (Watanabe 1966; Keally & Muto 1982; Imamura 2001) suggest that this site is older than 500 B.C. and most likely 600 B.C. These simple radiocarbon dates become about 750-800 cal B.C. in calibrated years (see Stuiver et al. 1998).

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 There are several other sites yielding iron artifacts that date from the beginning of Early Yayoi, for example, the Saitoyama Shellmound in Kumamoto Prefecture (Wajima 1967, pp. 435-436), the Imagawa site in @#&#036;%uoka Prefecture (Saiko no tetsu 1980), and the Okamoto Yonchome site in @#&#036;%uoka Prefecture (Nihon saiko no tekken 1980).

 There even are two Latest Jomon sites claimed to have evidence of metal use in Japan before the Yayoi Period began. Cutting and stabbing marks on human bones from the Itoku site in Kochi Prefecture were identified as those made by a metal implement (Jomon-jin no hone 2002; Kizu ato jinkotsu 2003). These bones were associated with middle to late Latest Jomon pottery, thought to date to around 2800-2500 B.C. [uncalibrated radiocarbon date]. The newpapers, however, reported the radiocarbon date [calibrated?] of this site as about 3200 BP, or about 1260-1130 B.C. [cal BC?] (Kizu ato jinkotsu 2003). There also is the completely overlooked terminal Latest Jomon site in Kushiro City, Hokkaido, that yielded a fragment of an iron artifact in a burial (Kono 1973). Available dates (Watanabe 1966; Keally & Muto 1982) suggest this iron dates to at least 500 B.C. (ca. 750 cal B.C.) and possibly 600 B.C. (ca. 800 cal B.C.) (see Stuiver et al. 1998)."

 

Bronze Treasures and Weapons in the Yayoi Period

 

 Kawagoe wrote: Bronze tools and objects were imported and cast and were greatly sought after as prestige goods and status symbols. Bronze mirrors were handed down as family heirlooms and buried in graves; bronze bells were the most treasured items and the Yayoi people over time collected and made larger and larger ones, sometimes ten times larger than those seen in Chinese mainland or Korean peninsula. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “The largest cache of buried bronze treasure ever discovered was found from two pits at Kojindani in Shimane prefecture: 358 bronze swords, 16 bronze spearheads and 6 bronze bells or dotaku (in Japanese). Bronze treasures found buried in graves of persons of high status are unusual and rare and are seen only in northern Kyushu. It is still a mystery as to why most bronze treasures are found most often in places faraway from settlement sites and graves from Kyushu to the Chubu district. The bronze treasures were possibly buried in an emergency due to enemy attack or as magical safeguards at the boundaries of their world. <^>

 “At first, the Yayoi people made bronze objects in the Korean tradition, however, they soon began to produce them in unique Japanese forms. One strikingly unique bronze object indigenous to Japan is the tomoe bronze cog-wheel ornament (resembling the ninja shuriken weapon but probably copied from the shape of the Harpago chiragra seashell bracelet) that was used to decorate shields and other objects. The tomoe/shuriken ornaments were found in Kyushu, Shikoku and the Kinai region. <^>

 “Bronze swords with broad blades, iron and bronze tools and weapons were a huge improvement over the obsidian or bone implements previously used. Metal was more durable and the sharp edges produced for weapons and tools made cutting tasks easier. This meant people could clear their land and reap their harvests more efficiently." <^>

 

Early Bronze in Japan

 

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Dotaku

 Kawagoe wrote: Yayoi Japan imported bronze from Korea from the end of the Early Yayoi period to the beginning of the Middle Yayoi period. Korean bronze products consisted of swords, spearheads, halberds, mirrors and small bells.Molds from early Yayoi times have been excavated in Japan from Souza and Yoshinogari sites (in Saga prefecture), evidence that bronze tools were cast in Japan soon after imported bronze products began to arrive in Japan. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “By middle Yayoi period, the Yayoi people were mostly making bronze tools and objects themselves. Moulds, mostly made of stone, from more than 60 sites have been recovered, and furnaces, moulds and bellow tuyeres were unearthed from pit-dwellings at the Yasunagata site. Large bronze bells were cast in major workshops in Yayoi Japan and then distributed over large areas – archaeologists have found bells cast from moulds at Higashinara (Osaka prefecture) but which have turned up further a field in Gahaishiyama (Kawagawa prefecture), Sakurazuka (Osaka prefecture) and Kehi (Hyogo prefecture). <^>

 “Lead isotope analysis gives scientists a very precise idea of where metal comes from, because the product can be matched to specimens in the mines. Experts have been able to know the following: 1) Korean imported bronze weapons and mirrors came from present-day mines in Korea; 2) Chinese imported mirrors used bronze material from northern China. 3) The earliest bronze bells made in Japan used materials of Korean origin. Thereafter, bronze bells were cast locally using raw materials in the form of lead ingots from northern China to supplement recycled bronze material. Out of 53 made in Japan mirrors, two of the oldest bells were found to be made of recycled Korean bronze, 33 were made of Chinese bronze from the Former Han period and 18 were made of bronze from the Later Han period. <^>

 “Other goods that were considered prestigious to the Yayoi and therefore sought after and hoarded as status symbols were bronze weapons such as bronze swords, halberds, daggers and spearheads. Yayoi bronze relics are concentrated in two regions: bronze weapons in north Kyushu and as far as the middle Inland Sea: and bronze bells in the eastern Inland Sea and as far east as the southern Tokai. The bronze objects overlap in the Inland Sea where both types of bronze objects can be found … indicating this was where the Tsukushi tribes of the south and the Kinki tribes of the east clashed." <^>

 

Origin of Japanese Mirrors

 

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 Kawagoe wrote: “It was supposed for a long time that all of the Yayoi and Kofun Japanese bronze mirrors came from Korea, but the position changed after metal analysis studies showed that the metals of most mirrors were of Chinese provenance. It is now the consensus view that only the first mirrors were Korean, thereafter the majority of Chinese mirrors were procured from the Han Chinese and then copied. The Wei mirrors found at the end of Yayoi were either Chinese- or Japanese-produced. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website,heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “According to scholars, 2,500 out of the 3,500 bronze mirrors found in Japan were made locally in Japan. The majority of Yayoi period mirrors were imported from China, one quarter were locally made in Japan. According to an earlier position, it was thought that during the Kofun period, three quarters of the mirrors were locally made, and were close copies of Chinese mirrors in terms of their chemical composition as well as techniques and motifs. A few local compositions and designs did however emerge. <^>

 “It has also been pointed out that Korean and Chinese mirrors have different designs – Chinese motifs of dragons and human figures were common while Korean ones tended towards geometric designs like triangle shaped patterns on the rims. A Korean-Japanese study, research effort, conducted between 2004-2010 entitled “Multilateral Comparative Study on Introduction, Acculturation, and Distribution of Bronze Culture in East Asia," examined bronze products mainly of the Bronze-Three Kingdoms periods, found in the Kyongsang-do region in Korea (Old Gaya confederacy and parts of Silla), as well as those found in the Japanese Archipelago, and conducted lead isotope analysis on them. The results revealed that some types of lead considered to have been produced in South China possibly originated in a mine in Chilgok-gun, located near Daegu City, Kyeongsangbuk-do. In addition, the group found that the bronze products containing these groups of lead first appeared and started to increase around the fourth century, concurrent with the expansion of Silla's influence into the Daegu region. In 2008, the group's research showed results concerning bronze products in Japan again, bringing up the possibility that some raw materials that had been considered to have been produced in China actually originated on the Korean Peninsula. Likewise, while mines in Yamaguchi Prefecture had been considered the first example of mass production in Japan, some bronze considered to originate from this region was found to possibly be from other regions. [Source: National Museum of Japanese History]

 

Bronze Bells in the Yayoi Period

 

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dotaku

 Kawagoe wrote: Bronze Bells were especially treasured by the Yayoi people — they were regarded as cult objects, ceremonial treasures. When the Japanese began to make the bells themselves, they made them bigger and better, and sometimes ten times larger than the Korean originals. They were probably then displayed prominently on some kind of platform or hung from a tree. Although the first bells were inspired by the Korean bronze bells and could be rung, later bells lost their original function. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website,heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “Bronze bells are called dotaku in Japanese. At present over 430 bells have been discovered, mainly from the Kinki Region, of which about 40 were found in Tokushima Prefecture and 39 were found at one site alone at Kamoiwakura, in Shimane prefecture (the largest number ever found). The Kamoiwakura bells were decorated with pictures of deer and dragonflies. They are thought to have been used in rites for worshipping the god that makes rice grow. <^>

 “The Korean-type small-sized bell from the Korean continent probably inspired the typical dotaku with the characteristic shape found in Yayoi Japan. Small horse bells called bataku usually not longer than 10 cm, were discovered at Kasuga city (three) in @#&#036;%uoka prefecture, a site at Usa city (one) Oita prefecture. They are thought to have been imported from Korea. <^>

 “Early bells were hung and jingled. Then their use was changed into bells that were no longer rung. As they got larger and larger and were sometimes more ornately decorated. They were likely used for public display, it is thought, during rice farming festivals in the Yayoi Period. Many hoards of the bronze bells were buried under the ground. Fourteen bells of different sizes, along with seven halberds were found on a forested ridge at Sakuragaoka-cho above the city of Kobe. While one theory has it that the bells may have been buried during emergencies such as during hostile attacks, since the bells are usually found isolated on hill terraces above fertile fields, they were most likely buried in some ritual ceremony to ensure a good harvest. The dotaku mysteriously disappeared fairly suddenly … coinciding with the next era when people started to construct kofun. <^>

 

Magical Bronze Mirrors from the Yayoi Period

 

 Kawagoe wrote: The Yayoi people began to import bronze mirrors from China from the Middle Yayoi period. Two bronze mirrors were discovered inside a wooden casket from the Hananotani burial mound in the @#&#036;%ui region of Japan. One of them made in the latter half of the 1st century B.C. was 9.6 centimeters in diameter and was decorated with patterns associated with rulers of Yayoi Japan. The second made during a later period was 22 centimeters in diameter bearing images of Chinese mythical beasts. Similar mirrors have been found at the Kurozuka mound in Nara and at Ishizuka mound in @#&#036;%uoka prefecture. [Source: Aileen Kawagoe, Heritage of Japan website, heritageofjapan.wordpress.com <^>]

 “The Chinese style mirror called Shinjukyo (“deity and beast mirror”) is decorated with deities and animals from Chinese mythology. They were frequently produced in China during the Han dynasty and during the 1st -6th centuries, but were also produced in the Lelang Chinese colony in Korea as well as in Japan. From the Records of Wei, the first historical reference to bronze mirrors is made that the Emperor presents to Queen Himiko of Wa “one hundred bronze mirrors” among other gifts. A well-known tomb from the Yoshinogari site in Saga Prefecture contained 33 shinjukyo bronze mirrors. Bronze mirrors, like bronze bells may have been worn around the neck during religious ceremonies to reflect the sun's rays and to indicate the wearer's high status." <^>

 To make a bronze mirror one first has to create a mold. If the mirror back has a lot of designs, the mold can take a considerable amount of time to make. Once the mold is complete bronze or cupronickel melted at a temperature of around 1200 degree C is cast in the mold. After the mirror is hardened and removed their reflective surface's created with five polishing procedures. Nickel plating is then applied to make surface perfectly smooth.

 Mirrors have a long association with Japanese religion. They are among the most scared objects in Shintoism, with a special mirror for the Japanese Emperor kept in Ise Grand Shrine in Mie Prefecture. A makyo mirror is a special mirror that appears perfectly smooth, but when a bright light is shined on it, an inscribed image can be seen in its reflected image in a wall. The image is usually spiritual symbol of some kind. To make such a mirror the design is created on the side of a sheet of metal. The other side which becomes the front of the mirror us is buffed for a considerable amount of time until the thickness of the mirror is reduced to less than a millimeter so the image appears when light strikes it.

 

Ritual Uses of “Magic” Mirrors in Ancient Japan

 

 Yayoi Period Japanese may have used “magic mirrors” to conjure up images of mountain wizards and divine beasts for sun-worshipping rituals, scientists at Kyoto Nation Museum said in January 2014. Tsuyoshi Sato wrote in the Asahi Shimbun, “The Kyoto National Museum said patterns engraved on the back of a type of bronze mirror associated with ancient queen Himiko are projected on a wall when sunlight reflects off the front. Ryu Murakami, head of the museum's curatorial board, said the discovery could provide valuable clues in studying how bronze mirrors were used in ancient Japan. “Someone apparently noticed the phenomenon and intentionally shaped mirrors in this way," he said. “I believe they have something to do with sun worship." [Source: Tsuyoshi Sato, Asahi Shimbun, January 30, 2014 /=/]

 “Using a 3-D printer, Murakami, an expert in historical materials science, produced replicas of two Sankakubuchi Shinjukyo mirrors from materials used in the originals, such as copper and tin powder. The mirrors, 21 and 24 centimeters in diameter, were found in the Higashinomiya tomb in Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture, and are owned by the Kyoto National Museum. The Sankakubuchi Shinjukyo mirror, believed to be produced around the third century, is characterized by its triangular rim when seen in cross-section. Its back features a relief engraving of wizards and mythical creatures. /=/

 “More than 500 mirrors have been unearthed in areas from the northeastern Tohoku region to the southern island of Kyushu, with many in the Kinki region. The mirror is associated with Himiko because some were inscribed with the year 239, when a Chinese emperor presented 100 bronze mirrors to the queen's emissary, according to a Chinese chronicle. Some ancient Chinese mirrors are known to function as magic mirrors." But the Kyoto National Museum “announcement was the first to confirm similar properties in an ancient mirror excavated in Japan. /=/

 “In a magic mirror, unevenness on the polished surface—too subtle to be detected by the naked eye—reproduces patterns on the back when sunlight reflects off the front. Minute concavities and convexities that mirror the backside designs are created during the polishing process. The concave parts focus light, while convex parts diffuse light, resulting in the projected image. Murakami has yet to confirm whether other types of bronze mirrors work like a magic mirror, but he believes that other Sankakubuchi Shinjukyo mirrors have similar projective qualities if substantial differences exist in the metal's thickness. /=/

 “Shoji Morishita, an associate professor of archaeology at Otemae University's faculty of cultural and historical studies, said researchers tended to focus on the back of bronze mirrors, but cutting-edge technologies have shed new light on the mirrors. “The finding could lead to reconsideration of the role of mirrors in ancient rituals," said Morishita, who is well versed in bronze mirrors. “Sometimes, dozens of mirrors are found from the same burial mound. Theoretically, it's not hard to imagine that they were lined up to project a number of images."“ <^>

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Bronze goods and bronze-making techniques from the Asian mainland reached the Japanese archipelago as early as the 3rd century BC. It is believed that bronze and, later, iron implements and weapons were introduced to Japan near the end of this time (and well into the early Yamato period). Archaeological findings suggest that bronze and iron weapons were not used for war until later, starting at the beginning of the Yamato period, as the metal weapons found with human remains do not show wear consistent with use as weapons. The transition from the Jōmon to Yayoi, and later to the Yamato period, is likely to have been characterized by violent struggle as the natives were displaced and assimilated by the invaders with their vastly superior military technology.^[11] The most well-regarded theory is that present-day Yamato Japanese are descendants of both the Indigenous Jōmon people and the immigrant Yayoi people. 

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by Lion.Kanzen