The is a group of ''

kofun are megalithic tombs or tumulus, tumuli in Northeast Asia. ''Kofun'' were mainly constructed in the Japanese archipelago between the middle of the 3rd century to the early 7th century AD.岡田裕之「前方後円墳」『日本古代史大辞 ...

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 ...

s located in the city of Kan'onji,

Kagawa Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located on the island of Shikoku. Kagawa Prefecture has a population of 949,358 (as of 2020) and is the List of Japanese prefectures by area, smallest prefecture by geographic area at . Kagawa Pr ...

, on the island of

Shikoku is the smallest of the List of islands of Japan#Main islands, four main islands of Japan. It is long and between at its widest. It has a population of 3.8 million, the least populated of Japan's four main islands. It is south of Honshu ...

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 tumuli were collectively designated a National Historic Site in 2015 with the area under protection expanded in 2020.

Overview

The Ōnohara Kofun cluster is located in the western part of Kagawa Prefecture, in the center of an

alluvial fan An alluvial fan is an accumulation of sediments that fans outwards from a concentrated source of sediments, such as a narrow canyon emerging from an escarpment. They are characteristic of mountainous terrain in arid to Semi-arid climate, semiar ...

formed by the Kushita River, overlooking the

Seto Inland Sea The , sometimes shortened to the Inland Sea, is the body of water separating Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu, three of the four main islands of Japan. It serves as a waterway connecting the Pacific Ocean to the Sea of Japan. It connects to Osaka Ba ...

. The site once consisted of over 170 tumuli, but most have been destroyed through urban encroachment and farmland improvement, and only the four largest tumuli have survived under National Historic Site protection.

Archaeological excavation In archaeology, excavation is the exposure, processing and recording of archaeological remains. An excavation site or "dig" is the area being studied. These locations range from one to several areas at a time during a project and can be condu ...

s have been carried out since 2006. The Wankashizuka Kofun, Hirazuka Kofun and Iwakurazuka Kofun are large circular burial mounds ( ), whereas the Kakuzuka Kofun is a large rectangular burial mound (). All have large stone

burial chamber A chamber tomb is a tomb for burial used in many different cultures. In the case of individual burials, the chamber is thought to signify a higher status for the interred than a simple grave. Built from rock or sometimes wood, the chambers could ...

s measuring 10 or more meters in length. In particular, the Wankashizuka Kofun has a total length of 14.8 meters and floor area of 24.6 square meters, or 72.7 cubic meters, making it the largest in Shikoku. From artifacts and

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 ...

recovered, these tumuli are presumed to have been constructed from the late Kofun period from the end of the 6th century to the early 7th century. In the Shikoku region, there are many examples of individual tumuli of a class similar to the ones in this group, but the Ōnohara Kofun cluster is unique in that several large tumuli were built in a group over three generations for about 50 years. The Wankashizuka Kofun is located behind the main hall of Onohara Hachiman Shrine. The tumulus is circular, measuring 37.2 meters in diameter and 9.5 meters in height, and was surrounded by a double moat, with a small embankment in between the moats. The burial chamber is a multi-room structure, consisting of a ear chamber, an antechamber, and a passageway, and opens to the southwest. It has a total length of 14.8 meters, with the rear chamber measuring 6.8 meters long, 3.6 meters widest, currently 3.9 meters high. Among the excavated items are pieces 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 and fragments of a wooden coffin. These artifacts date the tumulus to the end of the 6th century. The Hirazuka Kofun has a chapel of the Onohara Hachiman Shrine on its summit. The tumulus is circular, and with a diameter of 50.2 meters is the largest tumulus in Kagawa Prefecture. It is surrounded by an 8.4-meter wide moat. The burial chamber opens in the south-southwest direction and is a single-room structure with a total length of 13.2 meters. The rear chamber is 6.5 meters long, 3 meters wide at maximum, and 2.6 meters high and was found to contain Sure ware

Haji ware is a type of plain, unglazed, reddish-brown Japanese pottery or earthenware that was produced during the Kofun, Nara, and Heian periods of Japanese history. It was used for both ritual and utilitarian purposes, and many examples have been found ...

and other items which date it to the beginning of the 7th century. The Kakuzuka Kofun is a square tumulus located adjacent to Onohara Central Park. It measures 41.7 x 37.8 meters, making it then largest square tumuli in Kagawa Prefecture. It was surrounded by a moat with a width of approximately 3.3 meters. The burial chamber opened to the south-southeast and has a length of 12.5 meters, with an inner chamber measuring 4.7 meters long, 2.6 meters widest, and 2.4 meters high. The stone used was mostly granite. Inside, fragments of Sue ware pottery were found, which were dated to around the first half of the 7th century The Iwakurazuka Kofun is located in the precincts of Onohara Hachiman Shrine, close to the Wankarizuka Tumulus, and excavations revealed that it was built over a portion of the outer moat of that tumulus. The Iwakurazuka Kofun is elliptical, with a major axis of 38.2 meters and minor axis of 36.4 meters and contained two burial chambers, both orientated to the east. Only the west chamber retains its stone walls. During excavation, late quantities of flat stones with single-character Buddhist votive inscriptions dating from the

Edo Period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

were discovered. The site is open to the public as an

archaeological park 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 and ...

, but the interior of the burial chambers are not accessible.

Gallery

Wankashizuka Kofun, funkyu-3.jpg, Wankashizuka Kofun Hirazuka Kofun (Kan-onji), entrance-1.jpg, Hirazuka Kofun Kakuzuka Kofun (Kan-onji), entrance-2.jpg, Kakuzuka Kofun Iwakurazuka Kofun, funkyu-2.jpg, Iwakurazuka Kofun

References

External links

Kan'onji City home page
{{in lang, ja History of Kagawa Prefecture Kan'onji, Kagawa Historic Sites of Japan Kofun clusters

Overview

Gallery

See also

References

External links