1936 map of Futago Kofun The is a

Kofun period The is an era in the history of Japan from about 300 to 538 AD (the date of the introduction of Buddhism), following the Yayoi period. The Kofun and the subsequent Asuka periods are sometimes collectively called the Yamato period. This period is ...

burial mound Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...

, located in the Sakurai neighborhood of the city of Anjō, Aichi in the

Tōkai region The is a subregion of the Chūbu region and Kansai region in Japan that runs along the Pacific Ocean. The name comes from the Tōkaidō, one of the Edo Five Routes. Because Tōkai is a sub-region and is not officially classified, there is ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. The tumulus was designated a National Historic Site of Japan in 1927, and its borders were expanded in 1955.

Overview

The Futago Kofun is a "two conjoined rectangles" type (), located in the on the Hekikai Plateau in

Yahagi River The is a river that flows from Nagano Prefecture's Kiso Mountains, Mount Ōkawairi, through Gifu Prefecture, and enters Mikawa Bay from Aichi Prefecture in Japan.Shōbōji Kofun Dimensions of Shōbōji Kofun The is a Kofun period burial mound, located in the Kira neighborhood of the city of Nishio, Aichi in the Tōkai region of Japan. The tumulus was designated a National Historic Site of Japan in 1936, with the area ...

Nishio is a city located in Aichi Prefecture, in the Chūbu region of Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 169,984 in 65,553 households, with a population density of 1,054 persons per km2. The total area of the city was . It is a regional ...

, and the largest of the Sakurai Kofun Group, which also includes the Himeogawa Kofun and twenty other tombs. The tumulus has a total length of 81 meters. The anterior portion has a width of 36 meters and height of 6.7 meters and the posterior portion has a width of 45 meters and height of 10 meters. The summit is flat, and there is a square protrusion about 15 meters square on the east side of the anterior portion, which may have been used as a stage for ceremonial purposes. What appears to be a space for an altar is still in its original form at the west foot. The tumulus is estimated to be around the last half of the 3rd to the first half of the 4th century due to the lack of ''

haniwa The are terracotta clay 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 ...

'' or ''

fukiishi ( or "roofing stone") were a means of covering burial chambers and Tumulus, burial mounds during the kofun period of Japan (). Stones collected from riverbeds were affixed to the slopes of raised kofun and other burial chambers. They are consi ...

''. Remnants of a moat remain along its western side. The Futago Kofun first appears in academic literature in 1887, at which time it was crowned by the small Sakurai Tenjin Jinja

Shinto shrine A Stuart D. B. Picken, 1994. p. xxiii is a structure whose main purpose is to house ("enshrine") one or more kami, , the deities of the Shinto religion. The Also called the . is where a shrine's patron is or are enshrined.Iwanami Japanese dic ...

. It was excavated in 1936 and again in 1959 and 1990. In 2003, the Anjō City Board of Education conducted a survey by excavating a total of five trenches. This excavation confirmed the presence of a circumferential moat ten meters wide and one meter deep on the north side of the tumulus. No

grave goods Grave goods, in archaeology and anthropology, are items buried along with a body. They are usually personal possessions, supplies to smooth the deceased's journey into an afterlife, or offerings to gods. Grave goods may be classed by researche ...

have been excavated, but only some fragments of

Sue ware was a blue-gray form of stoneware pottery fired at high temperature, which was produced in Japan and southern Korea during the Kofun, Nara, and Heian periods of Japanese history. It was initially used for funerary and ritual objects, and orig ...

pottery. The site is about 10 minutes on foot from Horiuchikōen Station on the Meitetsu Nishio Line.

References

External links

Aichi Cultural Properties Navi

{{in lang, ja History of Aichi Prefecture Anjō, Aichi Historic Sites of Japan Zenpō-kōhō-fun

Overview

See also

References

External links