After the Quakes: The Impact of Disasters on
Japanese Archaeology and Heritage Management
OKAMURA Katsuyuki1
ABSTRACTIn earthquake-prone Japan, archaeology is strongly involved, in various manners, with past andpresent disasters. After the Great East Japan Earthquake 2011, archaeologists had been obliged
to face with a number of challenges intensively both in archaeological studies and heritage
issues after the disaster; 1) rescuing heritage, 2) reconstructing community with heritage, 3)
managing and/or operating intensive rescue excavation prior to development for reconstruction,4) investigating traces of past disasters during excavation and 5) coping with creation of new
heritage (memorial monuments). Japanese archaeology looks in a good position to promote amodel of disaster-led archaeology as a kind of ‘public’ archaeology for disaster prevention andrisk management. The discipline would be a new archaeological ﬁeld with interdisciplinary andinternational character.
KEYWORDS: disaster, earthquake, tsunami, Japanese archaeology, heritage management,
disaster-led archaeology

1.

Introduction

A big earthquake recently occurred in Kumamoto causing heavy damage to cultural
heritage including Kumamoto Castle, temples and shrines and it will affect undergroundarchaeological heritage in due course, as happened previously in Kobe and Tohoku.
Unfortunately, Japan has suffered three severe earthquakes in the last twenty years: here
in the Kansai area, we had the Hanshin-Awaji quake in 1995. At that time I was involvedin a variety of activities to support archaeologists in the affected area along with some of
the current WAC-8 Executives. It is said that 20% of all earthquakes in the world occur
in Japan, and 70% of active volcano is concentrated here (Figure 1). I sincerely hope wewill not have any quakes during this conference.
Thus in earthquake-prone Japan, archaeology and archaeologists are inevitably andstrongly involved with past and present disasters in various manners. In my talk, I willﬁrstly review what happened, particularly in relation to cultural heritage after the Great
East Japan earthquake, and how it was rescued and researched. Then I will consider how
1 Osaka City Cultural Properties Association, 1–6–41 Hoenzaka, Chuo Ward, Osaka 540–0006, Japan(okamurak@occpa.or.jp)
Category: Review Article (solicited)

Received: 25 October 2016

JAPANESE JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY 4 (2017): 191–200

OKAMURA Katsuyuki

Figure 1. The World Atlas of Natural Disaster Risk, Expected Annual Multi-hazard Risk Levelof Mortality and Affected Population of the World (2015, Measured by Total Risk Index), Available
at: http://www.futureearth.org/news/world-atlas-natural-disaster-risk-ranks-exposure-11-naturalhazards (accessed 30 September 2016)

Japanese archaeologists can contribute to the archaeology of disaster in general, while
previewing some presentations under the theme “Disaster” at this conference startingtomorrow.

2.

Saving heritage

As you already know, the biggest earthquake ever recorded in Japan occurred off theSanriku Paciﬁc coast, with a magnitude of 9.0. The earthquake hit a vast area coveringparts of the Tohoku and Kanto regions, stretching more than 500 km from north tosouth, included in which are Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures which sufferedparticularly severe damage. The resulting tsunami tidal-wave reached more than 30
meters in height at some areas, and spread more than a few kilometers inland from thecoast, destroying virtually everything; people, cars and structures, along the way (Figure2). Almost 20,000 people have died or been lost. To make things worse, the Fukushima
No.1 Nuclear Power Station was catastrophically damaged and has since been causing
serious radiation contamination, resulting in the evacuation of the residents. Deﬁnitely,
the damage caused by the disaster is the worst since WW II.
Damage caused to cultural heritage is also very serious and wide-ranging. It’s far© Japanese Archaeological Association192

AFTER THE QUAKESFigure 2. The 2011 tsunami at 15 : 25 on the 11th of March, taken from the 5th ﬂoor of Miyako CityHall, Iwate Prefecture. Photo by Shin’ya Kumagaya (Iwate Nippou Press)

more severe than in 1995. Speaking only of designated national cultural properties, morethan 700 such properties have been damaged, including 5 national treasures (Agencyfor Cultural Affairs 2012; Japan ICOMOS National Committee 2011). The stone wallsof many castles and fortresses were damaged, and numerous stone monuments intemples and shrines collapsed. The total loss and damage to architectural heritage ismost severe in the tsunami devastated areas. For instance, in Iwanuma City, Miyagi
Pref. the half of the city area was ﬂooded, and temple and shrines along the coast werecompletely swept away. This Rikuzen-Takata municipal museum in Iwate prefecture wascompleted destroyed. The disaster also took the lives of all six members of the museum
staff. Rescue activities were very active in many areas across the devastated region.
In total, 6,800 people joined in the rescue efforts at ninety locations over two years(Figure 3; Tateishi 2014). It will no doubt take a very long time to complete the rescueof tangible cultural properties, but as the phase was shifting from initial clean-up to thereconstruction of the destroyed infrastructure and villages/towns, problems concerning
the protection of buried cultural properties were becoming increasingly acute by the day
and demanded urgent response.
However, it is no easy task as we have to remind ourselves that there are some 6,000
archaeological sites in Miyagi and 13,000 in Iwate Prefecture. Especially in the Sanriku
region, more sites are located on the hills than on the coastal plains, and the presenceof many undiscovered sites is also expected. Some mass media reported on this issue
claiming “archaeological sites on hills would be an obstacle to re-location.” In April
2012 the Agency of cultural affairs, issued a notice “Regarding Cultural Properties© Japanese Archaeological Association

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Figure 3. Recovering historical documents from a warehouse on the 7th of April 2011 by theMiyagi Historical Documents Conservation Network in Ishinomaki City, Miyagi Prefecture. Photoby Shuichi Saito

Management Related to Restoration and Reconstruction Associated with the Great East
Japan Earthquake, as they did in 1995. It consists of four articles, but the point is toencourage speedy excavation, so as to not delay reconstruction works, and the active
dissemination of research results to local people and developers. As a practical means
to undertake the necessary excavation, Iwate, Miyagi, Fukushima Prefectural Boardsof Education, and the Agency of Cultural Affairs asked other local governments for anarchaeological labour-force, and from April 2013 in total 60 archaeologists were sent
to engage in excavation prior to the reconstruction development of towns. I was oneof them. The Agency initially planned to continue this support system for 3 years, but
extended the program in order to meet the demands from local governments.
In the case of the Hanshin-Awaji earthquake, more than 100 archaeologists in total
were sent to the affected area from as many as 40 different prefectures for three years.
Before they started excavation in the affected area in 1995, archaeologists were nervous,and seriously worried they might be stoned by angry local people who objected toexcavation in such an urgent situation. But, actually it never happened. Surprisingly,
archaeological investigations were carried out in the affected area in almost the same
way as they had been before the earthquake, as the reconstruction works continued
smoothly, thanks to the reinforced AHM and the efforts of the stakeholders. More than
500 excavations were undertaken prior to the construction of the houses, and many
discoveries had enough impact to alter the understanding of the local history.
It was said that the area considered for excavation in the Tohoku region after the Great
East Japan was expected to be 10 times bigger than that of 1995. For instance, Iwate© Japanese Archaeological Association194

AFTER THE QUAKES

Figure 4. Excavating the Niidatate medieval fortiﬁed village site, Minami-sanriku town, theMiyagi Prefecture

Prefectural Centre for Archaeological Heritage excavated 170,000 square meters in total
prior to reconstruction at thirty sites in ﬁscal 2013. This is one of the largest excavations
before the Relocation project (Figure 4). The tsunami washed away the entire village at
the foot of the hill. Despite the immediate issues faced by archaeologists, archaeologicalinvestigations were again surprisingly carried out in almost the same manner as they
had before the quake. Numerous discoveries had greatly altered the understanding of thelocal history (Negita 2014) and the public was often invited to open days.
The Cultural Heritage Management issues in Fukushima are rather different fromthose of other areas due to radiation contamination, in addition to the effects of thequake and tsunami (Kikuchi 2015, Schlanger, Nespoulous & Demoule 2016). Even
though more than 5 years has passed since the quake and tsunami, 90,000 people arestill affected by the evacuation from the disaster area or their home with many people
still living in temporary housing. As for cultural heritage, most of the major culturalproperties have been rescued from the restricted area thanks to committed archaeologists
and heritage managers. These are now being stored safely, but where and how to exhibit
them has not been decided and is under serious consideration. Mr. Honma, a Fukushimaarchaeologist, said that we ﬁrst appreciate the meaning of local community, culture, andheritage (including intangibles), only once we’ve lost them. Heritage is more than justobjects (Honma 2012). One ongoing serious issue for archaeological heritage is a planby the Ministry of Environment to make an “interim” storage facility for contaminatedsoils in Okuma and Futaba Towns. Since it is so large, 19 square km, it will affect thehistorical landscape, and archaeological resources.
© Japanese Archaeological Association

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Salvage excavations dramatically increased in Fukushima too. Since it is so large,
the third largest prefecture in Japan, they had to survey the area to identify all the siteswithin the potential development area as soon as possible. During 2012–13, 5 million
square metres were to be surveyed in mountainous areas planned for soil extraction
to build up the soil in the sunken coastal area. At some sites we ﬁrst measured theradioactivity contamination level, and found it was higher than permitted: 1 micro
ceevel. So we started peeling off the surface until we reached a safer level. The removed
soil was temporarily put outside the site, but it would eventually be moved to the‘interim’ storage facility. Though the site here is located 50 km from the affected power
station, generally speaking, forested areas gain relatively high contamination.

3.

Pursuing past disasters

I want to turn from heritage issues to archaeology. Since the quake, Japanesearchaeologists, particularly in the Tohoku region, have worked hard on research and reexamination for traces of past earthquakes and tsunami, and have tried to utilize suchinformation for public disaster prevention as a duty of their profession. Behind the scenes,
they agonize over whether or not they properly disseminated information about pasttsunamis. An example of archaeologists’ work on the accurate recognition of traces of pasttsunamis can be seen at the Kutsukata site, Sendai City (Saino 2012). The site is located
4.3 km from the present shoreline, and here they found 2000BP (middle Yayoi Period)
paddy ﬁelds covered by a layer of white sand. They carried out a number of drillings to
conﬁrm the horizontal distribution of the sand, and the continuity of tsunami deposit fromthe inland limit to the paleo-shoreline of 2000 years ago. Through thorough research of
the deposits, including grain size analysis, they ﬁnally determined that the white sandwas deﬁnitely tsunami deposit, and then conducted further research to compare the scaleof the 2000BP tsunami with the 2011 tsunami by measuring deposit inundation distancefrom the then shoreline. Finally the research clariﬁed that a tsunami of the same scaleas the one in 2011 occurred 2000 years ago. They also found traces of three well-known
historically tsunami together at the Takaose site, 200 m west of Kutsukata.
I remember that in 1996, one year after the Great Hanshin Awaji quake, we edited“Earthquake traces unearthed” with the cooperation of 150 archaeologists from all overJapan. It covered all the traces of the past earthquakes excavated at nearly 378 sites(Maibun-kyuen renraku kaigi & Maizou-bunkazai kenkyu-kai 1996). However, as time
passes, the attention and interest once directed at earthquake has ﬁzzled out, and themessage we managed to bring through the mediation of archaeology has been forgotten.
However, in April 2014, it was decided that the Nara National Research Institute forCultural Properties should start creating a database for all the traces of natural disaster© Japanese Archaeological Association196

Figure 5.

The GIS database model of the historical natural disaster and hazards (from Murata 2016)

AFTER THE QUAKES© Japanese Archaeological Association

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OKAMURA Katsuyuki

across the country from excavation reports and set up a network of experts whiledeveloping research methods and technology over the following 5 years (Figure 5). I
really hope it will continue to the next step and establish a system where any discoveryof a disaster is recorded and automatically reported to the national storehouse for thesake of disaster prevention and risk management. When this happens archaeology will
be accepted as a discipline more relevant to contemporary society. At WAC-8, Japanese
geo-archaeologists will talk about traces of past disasters with a desire to convey amessage of ‘learning from the past.’
The ﬁnal issue concerning archaeology & heritage after the quake is preservation ofmemorial buildings or structures to commemorate the disaster. Who can or should decideon the preservation of memorial structures after a great disaster? Does the decision lie
with local residents, the local government or even the central government? The people
concerned with managing heritage should observe how new ‘heritage’ is being created,as once we did for the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.

4.

‘Disaster-led archaeology’ as our role and mission

I mentioned 4 topics concerning archaeology and heritage management after the greatearthquakes. They are associated with each other, and often discussed altogether. I waswondering what we should concisely call this ‘package,’ but a friend of mine, Prof.
Nathan Schlanger created a new word, ‘Disaster-led archaeology’ after the better-known
notion of ‘developer-led’ archaeology. I want to adopt this term.
From the investigation of the true power and mechanism of the Great East Japan
Earthquake and the frequency of aftershocks, plus the recent Kumamoto earthquake,a number of seismologists and geologists argue that the Japanese archipelago and thesurrounding areas have entered a phase of increased seismic activity. Disaster-led
archaeology would be a fatalistic subject, and should be considered as a kind of ‘publicarchaeology’ for archaeologists living in earthquake prone countries like Japan. Thisis very challenging, but would be an opportunity to promote a number of aspects ofcontemporary archaeologies. What we should do now is to connect the past to the future.
Combining “disaster, heritage and archaeology” together, and thinking hard about what
we can do about them are our responsibility and mission.
We call for the cooperation and collaboration of the archaeologists across the world.
Let’s get together!

Acknowledgements
I would like to express my deep gratitude to Robert Condon for his advice and assistance© Japanese Archaeological Association

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AFTER THE QUAKESwith translation and proofreading.

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