Archaeological research has provided compelling evidence for the development of specialization in the manufacture of the high-prestige goods encountered in the rich burials of this period. At Furu on the Nara Plain, for example, excavations have uncovered a center for the production of iron blades dating 450-550 C. E. The wet conditions in part of the site led to the survival of wooden hilts, both complete and unfinished, of knives and swords. There were also the foundations of square buildings thought to have been storehouses. Soga Tamazukuri was a site that concentrated in the production of stone beads. The sources of the talc, jasper, and tuff are exotic to the Nara Plain and reveal the transportation of raw materials over considerable distances for processing there.
The move of the political center onto the Osaka Plains saw the construction of the largest tombs recorded in Japan and probably the largest mounded-earth tombs ever constructed. The Furuichi group contains the so-called Ojin tomb, which attained a length of 420 meters (462 yds.), while the Mozu group incorporated the Nin-toku tomb 486 meters in length. The grave offerings in the tombs of this period included huge caches of weapons: One located near the Qin tomb contained 77 iron swords. These massive tombs also held assembled-chest coffins formed by joining large slabs of stone.
Inscribed swords provide evidence for the extension of Yamato control during the fifth century. That from INARIYAMA is dated to 471 C. E., during the reign of King Yuryaku (r. 457-479). It had belonged to a member of the official group of sword-bearer guards of the royal palace, who was an official of the court located more than 300 kilometers west of the tomb. A second inscribed sword dating to the same reign from the mound of EDA-FUNA-YAMA on the far west coast of Kyushu included the word okimi, “great king,” and thus confirms central control over a region 550 kilometers to the west.
World History
