Megalithic mound (tumulus with integral stones)Classical antiquity
北条古墳
DatedEst. 250–650 CE
No licensed photograph yetWe have no photograph we may publish for this site, so the interpretive 3D view leads instead.
Overview
About this site
Overview
Hōjō Kofun (北条古墳) is a square burial mound at Saikusho in Tamba-Sasayama, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. It was built in the Middle Kofun period, in the first half of the 5th century (or possibly the middle of the 5th century), and is a designated historic site of Hyōgo Prefecture.
Each side of the mound measures 35 metres, and it is regarded as an earlier chiefly tomb than the much larger Kumobe Kurumazuka Kofun in the same basin.
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Where it sits in time
The site's dated range, placed against world reference points.
The scale is logarithmic: each step to the left is about ten times older than the last.
Article
北条古墳
The mound stands at the tip of an isolated hill on the eastern edge of the Sasayama basin.
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
The mound stands at the tip of an isolated hill on the eastern edge of the Sasayama basin. Its plan is square, with a side of 35 metres, and it was built in two tiers. Cylindrical haniwa and shaped haniwa in the form of houses, short armour and quivers have been recovered from the mound surface. The burial facility is presumed to be a clay chamber, and an iron sword or iron spear is said to have been among the grave goods.
Research historySources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
The burial facility was exposed when soil was removed from the north side of the mound, which revealed that the hill was a tomb; the cutting has since been backfilled. A survey was carried out in 1963 by the Taki Student Local History Research Society. On 30 March 1970 the site was designated a historic site of Hyōgo Prefecture.
DatingSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
The mound is estimated to date from the first half of the 5th century, or possibly the middle of the 5th century, within the Middle Kofun period. The catalogue record gives a typological estimate of 250 to 650 CE for kofun of this kind.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
In the Sasayama basin the largest tomb in the Tamba region is Kumobe Kurumazuka Kofun at Higashihonjō, and Hōjō Kofun is thought to be a chiefly tomb that preceded it. Many round mounds are distributed across the basin, but square mounds such as Hōjō Kofun and Himezuka Kofun are characteristic of its eastern part. Square mounds of the same period are also known in the Fukuchiyama and Kameoka basins, and some scholars have suggested political relations with those regions.
Kofun are the great burial mounds of ancient Japan, built mainly between the middle of the third century and the early seventh century CE. Besides the keyhole-shaped mound, there are plain round mounds, double-rectangle mounds and square mounds.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
Japanese kofun tumuli
Kofun are the great burial mounds of ancient Japan, built mainly between the middle of the third century and the early seventh century CE. The period takes its name from them. The most distinctive form is the keyhole-shaped mound (zempō-kōen-fun), with one square end and one round end seen from above, but there are also plain round mounds, double-rectangle mounds and square mounds. Orientation is not fixed: in the Mozu group at Sakai, some round parts face north and others east.
The largest is Daisenryō kofun at Sakai in Osaka, the biggest kofun in Japan, thought to have been built over some twenty years in the middle of the fifth century. By common acceptance it is the tomb of Emperor Nintoku, and the Imperial Household Agency treats it as such, but this cannot be confirmed because the mound has not been excavated. It stands in the Mozu group, which once had more than a hundred tombs of which fewer than half remain; the group and the neighbouring Furuichi cluster were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2019. The mounds were built on a plateau overlooking Osaka Bay, near the ancient coastline.
Dating rests on mound shape, pottery and grave goods. Haniwa, which means "clay circle", are terracotta cylinders and figures of houses, animals and people that were arranged in rings and rows around and on top of the mounds. Smaller kofun are very numerous and sit in groups in every region of Japan.
When visiting, look for the moat that surrounds the larger mounds, for the stepped outline of terraces, and for reconstructed haniwa in museums and parks beside the tombs.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Kofun, Wikipedia: Daisen Kofun, Wikipedia: Haniwa, Wikipedia: Mozu Tombs · CC BY-SA 4.0
See it in 3D
An interpretive reconstruction of the monument, standing on the real ground at its exact point, under the sun for that place and season. Drag to look around it.
The reconstruction is ours, not a survey: it shows what a monument of this type looks like, at the size the record gives for this one.
Lore
Evidence & Lore
What the sources actually support — and, kept apart, what has been claimed.
What the evidence supports
Dates
Est. 250–650 CEHow this date was established: Type comparisonTypical range for megalithic mounds in Japan; this site has not been dated itself. Japanese kofun burial mounds were mainly constructed between the middle of the 3rd century and the early 7th century AD.Source for this date
Where it stands
Japan
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 35°05′26″ N, 135°18′36″ EFor a GPS or map app: 35.09050, 135.31010
Access is as our sources describe it; we have not visited the site to check.
Nearby
The closest sites in the Atlas, by straight line.
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Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
2 sources behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q48747648wikidata.org
- 02Source for this dateen.wikipedia.org
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Around this place
The ten nearest sites, by compass
Credit
Text, licence and sources
Adapted from the Wikipedia article "北条古墳" (Japanese), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; authors are listed in the page history. Reused under CC BY-SA 4.0. Read on Wikipedia · Edit history and authors
- Wikipedia (Japanese): 北条古墳CC BY-SA 4.0
- Wikidata Q48747648CC0