Tsuboi/Daifuku site (Tokiwa-chō, Kashihara city/Daifuku, Sakurai city)
This site centers on archaeological features from the Final Jōmon to the Early Kofun periods, which spreadout from Tokiwa-chō and Higashi Takeda-chō in the northeastern part of the city of Kashihara, to Daifuku
in the western part of the city of Sakurai, and located in the southeastern Nara basin atop a compound
alluvial fan of 62–65 m elevation between the Tera and Yone rivers, flowing from Mt. Tōnomine into theNara basin. The site name “Tsuboi/Daifuku” has come to be used as a comprehensive term for the two sitesof Tsuboi (in Tokiwa-chō, Kashihara) and Daifuku (in Sakurai) through recognition of the two as a single
related site as investigations have proceeded. However, one portion of the Daifuku site to the southeast of
Tsuboi and physically separate from it (the Daifuku Elementary School sector) is currently still labeledsimply as the Daifuku site, and distinguished from the Tsuboi/Daifuku site.
The principal features include jar burials from the Final Jōmon period; moats encircling a settlement
district, along with pits, post holes, coffin burials, and jar burials of the Early to the end of the Middle
Yayoi periods; and large ditches (moats), pits, square-shaped moated burial precincts, and wooden coffin
burials of the Late Yayoi period. As the Late Yayoi burial precincts were built outside the moats it isthought that the settlement and burial districts had become separate. The principal artifacts include agoggle-eyed clay figurine of the Final Jōmon, a potsherd with a drawing of a human figure in a bird
costume (possibly a shaman) and a lacquered wooden sword grip of the Middle Yayoi, and a wooden
cuirass (armor breastplate) from the Early Kofun period. As an item worth particular mention, there is longnecked jar of the Late Yayoi period which held the bones of a single dog. As it would have been difficult toinsert the animal while it still had flesh and skin, it is thought to have been a secondary burial of theprincipal bones that were dug up and gathered for placement in the jar after the animal had been buried
initially.
In the environs of this site, there are the Ōsumi site on the southern side, and the Daifuku site to thesoutheast. As the Ōsumi site is adjacent to the Tsuboi/Daifuku site, the possibility of these comprising asingle related site has been pointed out. The Daifuku site is famous for a dōtaku (bronze bell) with ridges
on the flange around the body, and multiple square-shaped moated burial precincts from the Late Yayoi tothe Early Kofun periods have been found, and it is hypothesized as a cemetery district for theTsuboi/Daifuku site.
The Tsuboi/Daifuku site witnessed its peak of development in the Middle Yayoi period, but in the Late
Yayoi the numbers of features decline even though the encircling moats were maintained. Features increaseat the nearby Daifuku site in the Late Yayoi. For this reason it is supposed that the people ofTsuboi/Daifuku exited from the moated area, in other words they advanced beyond the moats to form a
new settlement (the Daifuku site). Thus the Tsuboi/Daifuku and Daifuku sites were not just related as
residential and burial districts of the Middle Yayoi, but also became organically integrated in the Late
Yayoi period. This is taken as a model case for considering the development of Yayoi period settlements.