In this episode we take a look at the Jomon period down in southwest Japan. Although Kyushu appears to have been the birthplace of much of what we consider Jomon culture, the Akahoya Eruption of the Kikai Caldera devastated Kyushu, wiping out the earliest cultures. Life would eventually return, bringing with it cultural artifacts from Honshu.

The Kyushu Jomon culture would move through several different types of settlement patterns and evolve over time, possibly even learning some form of rudimentary agriculture. We’ll talk about the possible connection between the enigmatic figurines and early agriculture.

Towards the end of the Jomon period, we see a new player on the scene: a new culture that we call the Yayoi, from the place in Tokyo where the first pottery from this period is found. This culture, influenced by the mainland, would compete with and eventually overcome or absorb the local Jomon culture, spreading north across Honshu.

References

• 2013 Pearson, Richard; Ancient Ryukyu. University of Hawai’i Press.

• 2007 Kaner, Simon and Ishikawa, Takeshi, “Reassessing the concept of the ‘Neolithic’in the Jomon of Western Japan”, Documenta Praehistorica XXXIV (2007) https://revije.ff.uni-lj.si/DocumentaPraehistorica/article/view/34.1/1809

• 2006 Shinto, Koichi; “Jomon Culture in Kagoshima and Uenohara Site”, Archaeological Center of Kagoshima Prefecture, Kokubu, Kirishima, 899-4461 Japan

• 2003 (June) Togawa, Minako; “The Jomon Clay Figurines of the Kaminabe Site, Kyushu, Japan”

• 2002 Mizoguchi, Koji; An Archaeological History of Japan: 30,000 B.C. to A.D. 700

• 1996 Imamura, Keiji; Prehistoric Japan: New Perspectives on Insular East Asia

• 1996 Aikins, C. Melvin and Akazawa, Takeru, “The Pleistocene-Holocene Transition in Japan and Adjacent Northeast Asia.” In: Straus L.g., Erksen B.V., Erlandson J.M., Yesner D.R. (eds) Humans at the End of the Ice Age: Interdiciplinary Contributions to Archaeology, pp 215-227, Spring, Boston, MA