The times when corded pottery was used in Japan is called the era of corded pottery (Jomon). From the pre-pottery Paleolithic times, Jomon is different in that pottery and a bow for shooting appeared. The emergence of Japanese or other ceramics has not yet been fully investigated.
The bow and arrow was replaced by the Paleolithic spear at a time when nothing was known about the samurai. It was the first automatic weapon to change the hunting method. Hunting small animals has become much easier and more efficient. Ceramic products appeared at a time when people realized the chemical variability of substances. It was concluded that a hard container can be made from elastic and soft clay with long processing. It was ceramic dishes that taught people how to make stew and cooked food. In this regard, a lot of previously unknown products have appeared in the diet, and in general the food has become of better quality.
According to 1994 data, the most ancient ceramic item is a "jug with a quasi-perfect ornament", which was found in Japan in the dungeon of the Senpukuji temple and was marked with the eleventh millennium BC. It was from this moment that the Jomon era began and lasted ten millennia. During this time, ceramic products began to be made throughout Japan. Compared to the rest of the Neolithic pottery cultures of antiquity, this one has become exceptional for Japan. Dzemon ceramics are characterized by limited delimitation, length in time, and similarity of styles. In other words, it can be divided into two regional groups developing by evolution, and their ornamental motives were similar. Most of all, the Neolithic pottery of Eastern Japan and Western Japan is distinguished. Although there are regional differences,all types of ceramics have similarities, which testifies to an integral archaeological culture. Nobody knows how many sites from the Jomon era were. According to 1994 data, there were one hundred thousand. This indicates a relatively high population density in Japan. Until the 90s, most of the sites were located in Eastern Japan, but archaeologists have made it so that the number of sites in the West and East will become approximately the same.
Jomon. 13 thousand BC - 3rd century BC hunter-fishing culture
The ethnologist from Japan K. Shuji believes that with the onset of the above-described era, twenty thousand people lived in Japan, in the middle of this period 260,000, at the end - 76,000.
Ancient Japanese economy
During the Jomon period, the Japanese economy was based on fishing, hunting, and food gathering. There is an opinion that elementary slash-and-burn agriculture was known to the Neolithic settlement, in addition, wild boars were domesticated.
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When hunting, the Japanese usually used a common bow. The researchers managed to find the remains of this tool in the marsh covers of the camps located in the marshy lowlands. At the time of 1994, archaeologists had found only thirty intact bows. They are made most often from capitate-yew types of wood and varnished with a dark color. At the end of the arrows there was a tip made of a powerful stone called obsidian. The spear was rarely used. Most often, various parts of the spears were found in Hokkaido, but for the Kanto this is an exception. And in Western Japan, spears were almost never found. On the hunt, they took with them not only weapons, but also dogs and wolf pits. Usually they hunted deer, wild boars and wild birds. Harpoons or fishing nets were used to catch fish, crabs, shrimps and so on. Remains of nets, weights, hooks were found in the ancient dumps. Most of the tools are made from deer bones. They are usually found in stops located on the shores of the sea and rivers. These tools were used for the seasons and were aimed at specific fish: bonits, pike perch, and so on. Harpoons and fishing rods were used alone, nets - collectively. Fishing developed especially well in the middle of the Jomon times.
Gathering was of great importance in the economy. Even at the beginning of time, Jomon used various vegetation as food for food. Most often, these were hard fruits, for example, nuts, chestnuts, acorns. Gathering was carried out in the autumn months, the fruits were collected in baskets woven from vines. Acorns were used to make flour, which was ground on millstones and made into bread. Some foods were stored in pits one meter deep in winter. The pits were located outside the village. Such pits are evidenced by the sites of the middle Sakanoshita period and the final Minami-Gatamaeike period. The population consumed not only solid foods, but also grapes, water nuts, dogwood, actinidia and so on. Grains from such plants were found near the stocks of hard fruits at the Torihama camp.
Most likely, the inhabitants were engaged in basic agricultural production. This is evidenced by traces of agricultural land, which were found in the area of the settlement.
In addition, people mastered the skill of collecting urtica and Chinese nettle, which was used in the manufacture of fabrics.
The oldest Japanese dwellings
Throughout the Jomon era, the population of the Japanese archipelago lived in dugouts, which were considered the classic shelter of the pre-ceramic period. The dwelling went deep into the soil, had a floor and walls made of earth, the roof was supported by a base of wooden beams. The roof consisted of dead wood, vegetation, and animal skins. There were different dugouts in different regions. There were more of them in the eastern part of Japan, and fewer in the western part.
In the early days, the construction of the dwelling was very primitive. It could be round or rectangular. In the middle of each dugout, there was necessarily a hearth, which was divided into: stone, pitcher or earthen. An earthen hearth was made as follows: a small funnel was dug into which brushwood was piled and burned. For the manufacture of a pitcher hearth, the lower part of the pot was used, it was dug into the soil. A stone hearth was made from small stones and pebbles, they were used to cover the area where the hearth was bred.
The first houses were dugouts with a roof of straw or branches.
Dwellings in regions such as Tohoku and Hokuriku differed from others in that they were quite large. From the middle period, these buildings began to be manufactured according to a complex system that involved the use of more than one hearth in one dwelling. The dwelling of that period was not only considered a place of finding peace, but also a space interconnected with beliefs and perception of the world.
On average, the total area of the dwelling was from twenty to thirty square meters. Most often, a family of at least five people lived in such a territory. The number of family members proves the discovery at the Ubayama site - a burial of a family was found in the dwelling, consisting of several males, several females and one child.
There are extensive premises located in North-Central and Northern Japan. More precisely, a dugout was excavated at the Fudodo site, consisting of four hearths.
The design is similar to an ellipse having a length of seventeen meters and a radius of eight meters. At the Sugisawadai site, a dwelling of the same shape was excavated, but the length was 31 meters, and the radius was 8.8 meters. It is not precisely established what the premises of this size were intended for. If we think hypothetically, then we can assume that these were storerooms, public workshops, and so on.
Ancient settlements
A settlement was formed from several dwellings. At the beginning of the Jomon era, one settlement included two or three houses. In the early period, the number of dugouts increased. This proves that people began to lead a sedentary life. Housing buildings were built around the area at approximately the same distance. This territory was the middle of the religious and collective life of the population. This type of settlement was called "round" or "horseshoe-shaped". Since the Middle Ages of the Jomon era, such settlements have become common throughout Japan.
The settlements were divided into: permanent and temporary, but in the first and second cases, people lived in the same territory for quite a long time. This proves the connection between the ceramic cultural styles of the settlement and the layering of settlements from the early era to the later.
The settlements consisted not only of dwellings, but also of structures on supports. The basis of such buildings was in the form of a hexagon, rectangle, ellipse. They did not have walls and a floor made of earth, buildings were located on pillars, supports, and there was no hearth either. The room was between five and fifteen meters wide. For what the buildings on the props were intended - no one knows.
Burial
The Japanese of the Jomon era most often attached the dead to the ground in mushl mounds, which were located not far from dwellings and were at the same time not only a cemetery, but also a dump. In the first millennium BC, common cemeteries were created. For example, at the Yoshigo site, researchers found more than three hundred remains. This indicated that the population began to lead a sedentary life and the number of people in Japan was growing.
Ancient Japan. Culture of ancient burial mounds
Most of human burials can be called a crumpled clutch of corpses: the limbs of a deceased person were folded in such a way that he looked like an embryo, he was simply placed in a dug hole and covered with earth.
In the third millennium BC, there were special cases when corpses were laid in an elongated form. At the end of this period, the tradition of burning the dead was introduced: a triangle was made from the burned limbs of the dead, and the skull and other bones were placed in the center. Usually burials were single, but there were also common graves, for example, family ones. The largest grave of the Jomon era was two meters long. About fifteen remains were found in it. Such a burial ground was found in the embankment of the Miyamotodai site.
There were not only pit burials in the musl embankments. Researchers have discovered a cemetery where the dead lay in a depression with a stone base or in huge stone coffins. Such burials were frequent finds towards the end of the era in northern Japan.
In Hokkaido, the dead were buried in vast special cemeteries with lavish funeral decorations. In addition, in Ancient Japan there was a tradition to bury children born dead, as well as up to six years of age, in ceramic vessels. There were cases when older people were buried in pots. After the bodies were burned, the remains were washed with water and stored in such a container.
Japanese beliefs and practices
The funeral decoration was used as an information source about the religion of the Japanese of the Jomon era. If there was an interior, it means that people believed that there is life after death and a soul. Together with the deceased, they most often put into the grave objects that the deceased person used during his lifetime. These could be rings, chains and other jewelry. Usually it was necessary to find belts made of deer antlers, which were covered with a beautiful intricate pattern, and bracelets made of bulky Rappani shells or glycimeris. An opening for the hand was made inside and polished to a shiny state. Jewelry had both aesthetic and ceremonial function. As a rule, bracelets were found in women's graves, and a belt in men's graves. The number of interior items and their luxury spoke of social, physiological and age division.
In later times, there was a tradition to pull out or file down teeth. Even during their lifetime, people were removed some incisors - this said that they were moving into the adult group. The methods and order of tooth extraction differed depending on the place and time. In addition, there was a tradition to file the four upper incisors in the form of two - or tridents.
There is another monument related to the religion of that period - these are female dogu figurines made of ceramics. They are also called the Jamon Venuses.
A clay figurine made during the Jomon period
These ancient figurines were discovered at the Hanawadai site and are believed to date back to the early days of the Jomon era. The figurines are divided, depending on the manner of manufacture, into the following types: cylindrical, flat, embossed with legs, with a face in the shape of a triangle, with ocular eyes. Almost all dogu depicts, most likely, a pregnant woman with a bulging tummy. Usually figurines are found broken. There is an opinion that such figurines are a symbol of the feminine principle, family, birth of offspring. The doga was used in fertility rituals. In the same cult, symbols such as swords and knives made of stone, sekibo sticks were used, which represented power, masculinity, influence. Statuettes were made of stone and wood. Dogu were a kind of amulets. In addition, the ancient Japanese made masks from ceramics, but where they were used remains a mystery to this day.
