Dairokuten Kofun: A Late Kofun-Period Burial Mound in Kawasaki, Japan
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 3.6
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Japan
- Primary era
- Medieval
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval
- Civilizations
- Yamato
- Site type
- Burial
- Remains
- Burial Mound
On this page6 sections
History
Dairokuten Kofun is a late Kofun-period burial mound in Kawasaki, Japan, built at the end of the sixth century as part of the Kasedai Kofun Group, also called the Hiyoshi-Kase Kofun Group. The Kofun period, spanning approximately the third to seventh centuries, was an era when elite burial mounds were constructed over tombs. The mound stood on the western edge of the Kase Plateau, which once extended farther west than it does today.
Construction and Destruction
The date of construction remains uncertain. Kawasaki City material places the mound in the latter half of the seventh century, while Kawasaki City Museum material dates its construction to the end of the sixth century and indicates that further burials continued until the beginning of the seventh century. Dairokuten Kofun disappeared along with the nearby Hakusan Kofun when soil-extraction work destroyed the part of the plateau where they stood.
In 1937, Tsunetsune Shibata, Sadanari Mori, and other members of the Mita Historical Society of Keio University excavated the mound. The horizontal stone burial chamber, a tomb entered from the side through a passage, was then moved to Keio University’s Hiyoshi Campus and displayed outdoors. It suffered severe damage during the Pacific War and the United States military requisition of the campus from 1945 to 1949. Many burial goods held by Keio University were also lost through wartime damage.
Relocation and Rediscovery
The chamber was moved again in the 1970s during the expansion of a high-school sports ground. No record was kept of this relocation, and the stones were buried soon afterward, leaving their new position unknown within the university. In 2012, Keio professor Hiromichi Ando noticed exposed mudstone near a tennis court while examining a blast-resistant shaft associated with the Hiyoshidai underground shelters. He recognized that the stones might belong to Dairokuten Kofun and led a confirmation investigation from March 6 to 8, 2013.
The investigation located the second relocation site in Area K of the Hiyoshidai Archaeological Site Group. This area also preserved in concrete the remains of Yayoi-period pit dwellings numbered 102–105 and 111. The Yayoi period preceded the Kofun period and was associated with rice agriculture, metalworking, and settled communities in the Japanese archipelago. The basal rows of the relocated chamber lay only 10 centimeters below the ground surface. Their scale closely matched the measured drawings from the 1937 excavation, and sandbags were placed to mark the chamber’s extent before the remains were reburied.
Remains
Mound and Stone Chamber
Dairokuten Kofun was a circular mound approximately 19 meters in diameter. Its burial facility was a multi-chamber horizontal stone chamber built from cut mudstone blocks. The main chamber had a barrel-shaped profile, and its floor was paved with flat gravel. A cist coffin, a box-shaped burial container assembled from stone slabs, was installed inside the chamber. After the relocations, the basal course was thought to be the only surviving part of the chamber, but the 2013 investigation confirmed the position of both the chlorite-schist coffin and the gravel floor.
Several stones were missing, and parts of the gravel floor differed in position and shape from the arrangement shown in the 1937 excavation report. These changes reflect destruction during and after the war. The surviving stones nevertheless retained the chamber’s measured scale and allowed its relocated position and principal internal features to be identified.
Coffin and Burial Goods
The chlorite-schist coffin contained the skeletal remains of eleven individuals. Burial goods were recovered from within the coffin and from areas both inside and outside the main chamber. They included a Sue ware flask, made in a high-fired ancient Japanese ceramic tradition commonly used for vessels placed in elite tombs, together with curved beads, faceted beads, and jujube-shaped beads. Metal objects included bronze bracelets, earrings, and gilt-bronze bells. These surviving details provide evidence for the tomb’s funerary use and the range of objects placed with the dead.
