ARCHAEOLOGIA JAPONICA

Northeast Asia
KIYAMA Katsuhiko1
This article is an overview of research by Japanese scholars in northeast Asia (Mongoliaand Russia east of Siberia) since 2008. International joint research by Japanese scholars
in this area began in full scale in the 1990’s due to political change. In the past, thenumber of researchers engaged in local research was rather limited, but now the number
has been increasing remarkably. Corresponding to the number of researchers, the area
being researched also has been increasing.
On Paleolithic study, studies on transition from Paleanthropine to Neanthropine arebeing conducted in the Transbaikal and Mongolian regions. Excavations from the Bronze
Age and Khitan in Mongolia tend to be conducted with research results in China inmind. It is natural since history and archaeological events around the two countries do
not necessarily match with the current border. There are many studies on Khabarovsk
and Sakhalin that attach importance to the relationship with Japan. The Russian Far East
region and northern Japanese Islands (Hokkaido) begun having a clear relationship in thePaleolithic, Early Jomon, or Okhotsk culture, and there are many excavation examples ofthe latter two. Due to continuous study on the Neolithic, the chronological organizationof the Neolithic has progressed, and the distribution range of each culture is gradually
being understood. Especially, various cultures that involve blade arrowhead tools are aﬁeld that has been drawing attention since they had inﬂuence on Hokkaido. Discussion
is being developed between two divided views: one hypothesis that a group with blade
arrowhead tools migrated from the continent, and the other looks for lineages fromlocal stone tools. Conﬂict between two extreme views, migration from the continent andlocally inherited development, was also seen in Okhotsk culture study. The leading viewon that matter is that continental characteristics of the culture were a result of strong
and extensive inﬂuence from formation of Mohe people. When Mohe people controlled
the whole region of the Far East, it gave a strong inﬂuence on the area that resulted incopying of their pottery and wide distribution of products, which seem like uniform
aspects at a glance, but different peoples’ lifestyle details were a continuation from theprevious regional culture. Perhaps the extensive development of blade arrowhead tools
1 Professional License Training Center (Museology), Tokai University,Shizuoka 424–8610, Japan(kiyama720@tsc.u-tokai.ac.jp)

JAPANESE JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY 3 (2015): 72–73© Japanese Archaeological Association

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JAPANESE JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY 3 (2015): 72–73

3–20–1 Orido, Shimizu Ward,TRENDS IN JAPANESE ARCHAEOLOGICAL
Title
ACTIVITIES ABROAD

was a similar type of event, although with a different cause. Aspects of Okhotsk culture
are still a hypothesis drawn from examination of limited research results. Continuation ofexcavation research is the only way to understand the relationship between the continentand northern half of the Japanese Islands, so accumulation of data and examination willcontinue to be signiﬁcant in the future.
Also it should be noted that research results on the Kamchatka Peninsula to Kuril
Islands have been submitted in the past ﬁve years. As new knowledge has been
accumulated on the distribution range of Jomon pottery and epi-Jomon pottery, thevalidity of the past prediction that distribution will expand to the epi-Jomon culturalphase is being conﬁrmed. Study on the Ainu culture phase is outstanding among
research on the Kamchatka Peninsula and northern Kuril Islands. Although it is only at
the stage of accumulating fundamental data, important results are being gained in order
to consider formation and development of Kuril Ainu.

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