is an

archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology an ...

containing a

Jōmon period The is the time in Japanese history, traditionally dated between 6,000–300 BCE, during which Japan was inhabited by a diverse hunter-gatherer and early agriculturalist population united through a common Jōmon culture, which reached a c ...

shell midden located in what is now part of the town of

Shinchi, Fukushima is a town located in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. , the town has an estimated population of 8,152, and a population density of in 2832 households. The total area is . Geography Shinchi is located in the far northeastern Hamadōri region of Fuk ...

in the southern

Tōhoku region The , Northeast region, or consists of the northeastern portion of Honshu, the largest island of Japan. This traditional region consists of six prefectures (''ken''): Akita, Aomori, Fukushima, Iwate, Miyagi, and Yamagata. Tōhoku retains a ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. The site was designated a National Historic Site of Japan in 1930.

Overview

During the early to middle Jōmon period (approximately 4000 to 2500 BC), sea levels were five to six meters higher than at present, and the ambient temperature was also 2 deg C higher. During this period, the Tōhoku region was inhabited by the

Jōmon people is the generic name of several peoples who lived in the Japanese archipelago during the Jōmon period (). The Jōmon people may have consisted of multiple groups, which arrived and merged at different times in the Japanese archipelago, using multi ...

, many of whom lived in coastal settlements. The

midden A midden (also kitchen midden or shell heap) is an old dump for domestic waste which may consist of animal bone, human excrement, botanical material, mollusc shells, potsherds, lithics (especially debitage), and other artifacts and ecofact ...

s associated with such settlements contain

bone A bone is a Stiffness, rigid Organ (biology), organ that constitutes part of the skeleton in most vertebrate animals. Bones protect the various other organs of the body, produce red blood cell, red and white blood cells, store minerals, provid ...

, botanical material, mollusc shells,

sherd In archaeology, a sherd, or more precisely, potsherd, is commonly a historic or prehistoric fragment of pottery, although the term is occasionally used to refer to fragments of stone and glass vessels, as well. Occasionally, a piece of broken p ...

s, lithics, and other artifacts and ecofacts associated with the now-vanished inhabitants, and these

features Feature may refer to: Computing * Feature (CAD), could be a hole, pocket, or notch * Feature (computer vision), could be an edge, corner or blob * Feature (software design) is an intentional distinguishing characteristic of a software item ...

, provide a useful source into the diets and habits of Jōmon society. Most of these middens are found along the

Pacific coast Pacific coast may be used to reference any coastline that borders the Pacific Ocean. Geography Americas Countries on the western side of the Americas have a Pacific coast as their western or southwestern border, except for Panama, where the Pac ...

of Japan, and the rocky

ria coast A ria (; gl, ría) is a coastal inlet formed by the partial submergence of an unglaciated river valley. It is a drowned river valley that remains open to the sea. Definitions Typically rias have a dendritic, treelike outline although they ca ...

from Iwate through northern

Fukushima Prefecture Fukushima Prefecture (; ja, 福島県, Fukushima-ken, ) is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. Fukushima Prefecture has a population of 1,810,286 () and has a geographic area of . Fukushima Prefecture borders Miya ...

was densely settled from the early through late Jōmon period. The site is located in a rural area near the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

. The midden has been known since at least the

Edo Period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

. Sakuma Yoshikazu, a local scholar, described it a journal listing the holdings of the Date clan. compiled at the order of the 4th ''daimyō'' of Sendai Domain,

Date Tsunamura was an early Edo period Japanese samurai, and the 4th ''daimyō'' of Sendai Domain in northern Japan, and the 20h hereditary chieftain of the Date clan. Tsunamura’s succession led to the ''Date Sōdō'' or "Date Disturbance" of 1671, which has ...

. Per this account, a small

Shinto shrine A is a structure whose main purpose is to house ("enshrine") one or more ''kami'', the deities of the Shinto religion. Overview Structurally, a Shinto shrine typically comprises several buildings. The '' honden''Also called (本殿, meani ...

near this midden was dedicated to the ''

kami are the deities, divinities, spirits, phenomena or "holy powers", that are venerated in the Shinto religion. They can be elements of the landscape, forces of nature, or beings and the qualities that these beings express; they can also be the sp ...

'' of Mount Kare, a 430-meter mountain to the west of town. A giant, the "Tenaga Myojin" lived on the mountain and had very long arms - so long that it could reach the ocean to pick up shellfish (its favorite food), whose shells it would deposit on what became the Shinchi Shell Midden. The shell midden attracted attention from archaeologists in the

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

and initial excavations were conducted in 1890 and in 1924 by Tokyo Imperial University. In addition to the expected shells and animal and fish bones, the midden was found to contain a unique design of pottery with ruffled decoration which was dubbed "Shichi-style pottery". The shell midden dates from approximately 4000 years ago. The Shinto shrine disappeared around 1887, but its foundations were discovered. The site has a stone marker and explanatory signboard. It is located about 30 minutes on foot from

Shinchi Station is a railway station in the town of Shinchi, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, operated by East Japan Railway Company (JR East). Operation of the station was suspended due to severe damage to the railway and station facilities caused by the 2011 T� ...

on the

JR East The is a major passenger railway company in Japan and is the largest of the seven Japan Railways Group companies. The company name is officially abbreviated as JR-EAST or JR East in English, and as in Japanese. The company's headquarters are ...

Joban Line.

References

External links

Shinchi town home page

Fukushima Tourist information home page
{{in lang, ja Jōmon period Shell middens in Japan Historic Sites of Japan History of Fukushima Prefecture Shinchi, Fukushima

Overview

See also

References

External links