TRENDS IN ARCHAEOLOGY IN JAPAN

Yayoi Period
HAYASHI Daichi1
There were some developments of study this ﬁscal year, showing maturity of fundamental
research that enables us to draw concrete images of Yayoi culture within East Asia, suchas correspondence between wide-area chronology that had been organized and shared
among researchers and calendar dating based on AMS C-14 dating, achievements ofarchaeobotany represented by “replica method,” as well as progress of research and study
in China and the Korean Peninsula.
There is an accelerated movement to reevaluate conventional frameworks of the Yayoi
period and culture, after FUJIO Shinichiro pointed out the problem. YAMADA Yasuhiro“Ichinichime no Toron ni Mukete: Sendai Heiya ni Yayoi Bunka ha Nakattanoka (Forthe First Day Discussion: Didn’t Yayoi Culture Exist in Sendai Plain?)” Sendai Heiya ni
Yayoi Bunka ha Nakattanoka: Fujio Shinichiro Shi no Sinsetsu Kouen to Iken Kokan:
Yokoshu (Didn’t Yayoi Culture Exist in Sendai Plain?: Lecture and Discussion on Mr.
FUJIO Shinichiro’s New Theory: Proceedings) Yayoi Jidai Kenkyukai, pp. 2–6, argued
that we should question the concept of the Yayoi period which was developed to discuss
the history of one county, and the validity of the framework that regards the culture ofthe Yayoi period equals Yayoi culture as one phase of food production.
Connected to this movement, discussion on the beginning of the Yayoi Period wasactive. MIYAMOTO Kazuo “Higashi Ajia ni Okeru Noko no Kigen to Kakusan (Originand Diffusion of Agriculture in East Asia),” Archeology Quarterly 138 Yuzankaku, pp.
18–31, regarded the beginning of the Yayoi period within a large movement of diffusionof early cultivation societies of East Asia to peripheral regions to form secondary
cultivation societies, and assumed the formation factor as migration from the southern
Korean Peninsula to northern Kyushu and cultural contacts that occurred in the cold
phase around the 8th century B.C.
ISHIKAWA Hideshi “Higashi Nihon Yayoi Bunka no Henkaku (Change of Yayoi
Culture in East Japan)” Sanennanshin Shuhen ni Okeru Chuki Yayoi Doki to Koryu:
Inasaku Donyuki no Shakai (Hokokuhen) [Middle Yayoi Pottery and Exchanges around
Sanennanshin Region: Society at Introduction Stage of Rice Farming (Reports)] Chiiki
1 c/oIshikawa Archaeological Foundation, 18–1 Nakato-machi, Kanazawa City, Ishikawa 920–1336,
Japan(d-hayashi@ishikawa-maibun.or.jp)
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JAPANESE JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY 6 (2018): 67–68

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ARCHAEOLOGIA

to Kokogaku no Kai (pp. 1–6), pointed out the possibility of social changes taking placein wide areas of Yayoi culture in East Japan in the middle of Middle Yayoi, and deﬁned
the end of jar reburial tombs as a historical phenomenon resulting from the change.
MIZOGUCHI Koji “Kako no Kioku to Sono Doin: Hokubu Kyushu Yayoi Jidai V-ki
wo Jirei Toshite (Memory of the Past and Its Mobilization: Example of Yayoi Period V
Phase in Northern Kyushu)” Kokogaku ha Kagakuka Jo: Tanaka Yoshiyuki Sensei Tuitou
Ronnbunshu (Archaeology, Is It Science? Volume 1: Memorial Theses for Prof. TANAKAYoshiyuki) Chugoku Shoten (pp. 545–559), aimed to reconstruct social structure andsystems by analyzing jar burial graves, and pointed out the possibility that the heritage
from the past was purposely and strategically remembered and mobilized. Further, it wasinferred that the upper class tried to conﬁrm and strengthen the legitimacy of its own
social position through burial conduct.
SUZUKI Toshinori “Minetashiki Doki to Sono Zengo (Mineta Style Pottery andSurrounding Time Period)” Sanennanshin Shuhen ni Okeru Chuki Yayoi Doki to Koryu:
Inasaku Donyuki no Shakai (Hokokuhen) [Middle Yayoi Pottery and Exchanges around
Sanennanshin Region: Society at Introduction Stage of Rice Farming (Reports)] Chiiki
to Kokogaku no Kai (pp. 39–52) pointed out the existence of a wide-ranging pottery
production/supply relationship in the middle of Middle Yayoi.

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