Hoshigatō Obsidian Mine Site
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Jōmon period In Japanese history, the is the time between , during which Japan was inhabited by the Jōmon people, a diverse hunter-gatherer and early agriculturalist population united by a common culture, which reached a considerable degree of sedentism 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 recorded history, historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline ...
consisting 193 shallow interconnected pits over a 35,000 square meter area, from which
obsidian Obsidian ( ) is a naturally occurring volcanic glass formed when lava extrusive rock, extruded from a volcano cools rapidly with minimal crystal growth. It is an igneous rock. Produced from felsic lava, obsidian is rich in the lighter element ...
had been mined, located in what is now part of the town of Nagawa in the
Chūbu region The , Central region, or is a region in the middle of Honshū, Japan's main island. In a wide, classical definition, it encompasses nine prefectures (''ken''): Aichi, Fukui, Gifu, Ishikawa, Nagano, Niigata, Shizuoka, Toyama, and Ya ...
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 ...
. It has been protected as a National Historic Site since 2015.


Overview

The Hoshigatō site is located northwest of slope of
Mount Kirigamine is a 1,925m volcano, located in Nagano Prefecture, Japan. Outline The tallest peak of Mount Kirigamine is Mount Kuruma, on which there is a weather radar site. Most of the mountain is covered in grass with sparse bushes and rocks. The south a ...
at an elevation of 1500 meters, within the Higashimata National Forest in the northeastern part of Shimosuwa. Obsidian, or "volcanic glass" was frequently used for
stone tool Stone tools have been used throughout human history but are most closely associated with prehistoric cultures and in particular those of the Stone Age. Stone tools may be made of either ground stone or knapped stone, the latter fashioned by a ...
s and weapons in the
Japanese Paleolithic The is the period of human inhabitation in Japan predating the development of pottery, generally before 10,000 BC. The starting dates commonly given to this period are from around 40,000 BC, with recent authors suggesting that there is good evi ...
period as it could be fractured by
lithic reduction In archaeology, in particular of the Stone Age, lithic reduction is the process of fashioning stones or rocks from their natural state into tools or weapons by removing some parts. It has been intensely studied and many archaeological industrie ...
to produce sharp blades or arrowheads, and frequently occurs in volcanic formation around Japan.
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 found that obsidian was extracted from this location from the early Jōmon period (about 5700 years ago) through the late Jōmon period (2000–1000 BCE). Physicochemical analysis has found that obsidian from this site was supplied to settlements distributed across an extremely wide range from Tōhoku to 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 ...
, indicating long distance trade. The site was discovered in 1920, and was excavated from 1959-1961, and again in 1997. There are no public facilities at the site and access is controlled by the Shimosuwa Town Board of Education.


See also

*
List of Historic Sites of Japan (Nagano) This list is of the Monuments of Japan, Historic Sites of Japan located within the Prefectures of Japan, Prefecture of Nagano Prefecture, Nagano. National Historic Sites As of 1 August 2020, thirty-eight Sites have been Cultural Properties of Ja ...


References


External links


Shimosuwa town official site
{{in lang, ja Shimosuwa, Nagano History of Nagano Prefecture Historic Sites of Japan Mines in Japan Obsidian Jōmon period sites