The Way of the Sun

Nakagawa Kenzo writes about the work of Kurozumi Hideo from Northern Earth 66
Translated by Kuroda Akiko

Many ancient remains and mounded tombs may be found in the Kibi District of Okayama Prefecture, in Japan. Taken together, they indicate the past existence of a powerful and influential centre of authority comparable to that in the Yamato region¹. In this area in the early 1970s, local historian, Kurozumi Hideo, discovered an alignment of a number of these ancient sites, falling on the 34° 39' N. latitude - the equinoctial line, 'the way of the sun'. This suggests a religious interest in the sun or in direction in those past times, and indeed Mr Kurozumi has said "It's strange, but when I walk around these places, I seem to be able to sense the intentions of those ancient people". Much of his free time is spent visiting these old remains.

In the winter of 1960, before the Late Yayoi-period¹ hilltop site of Tatetsuki in Kurashiki had been excavated, Kurozumi climbed the hill with members of the Prefectural Education Board. They inspected the mound, 40m in diameter and 4-5m in height, which stands on top of the hill and the stone circle which is on top of the mound, and some of the board-members remarked on the possibility of Tatetsuki's connection with a form of sun-worship and suggested further research on these lines.

Kurozumi's interest in this site took him there early on the spring equinox that year, to watch the sunrise and set from the mound. It rose above Iiyama (a peak in the Kibinakayama range) and set behind Edayama in Kurashiki. On both mountains there are iwakura³; Edayama has three large 'standing stones'. Wondering if this had any significance, Kurozumi drew a line on the map between these three points and extended it in each direction. The results were interesting; to the west, the Miyayamasu group of kofuns and the iwakura of Kimurayama in Soja fell on the line, while to the east lay Kinzosan kofun⁴ and the Buddhist carvings of Matsuyama Choshoji. In all, some 23 sites came into the alignment, spurring Kurozumi to embark upon his field surveys of local sacred sites and tombs, driving from one place to another along the 70km stretch of the alignment in Okayama Prefecture. Since the remains are usually in the hills and forests and sometimes have no paths to them, he has on numerous occasions had to make his own way through thick undergrowth.

His main line of enquiry at that time was how the alignment could have been made and what this discovery could mean in terms of modern peoples' understanding of their ancestors. As his research developed, the connection with the worship of the sun or certain directions occurred to him, and he looked to academics for further information. His suspicion was confirmed by a visit to Yamada Yasuhiko, Professor of Regional Studies at Chiba University. There he learned of evidence of past awareness of equinoxes and solstices in Japan; that sunset on the solstices was apparently associated with ancestral reverence, while the sunrise on winter solstice signified the rebirth of life energy or fertility. Winter solstice is also said to be the climax of in (yin) and the point of emergence of yo (yang) energies - i.e. the birth of the sun. Following up this information, Kurozumi went away and found that the summer solstice sunset line from Tatetsuki (30° WNW) is marked by Zozan kofun, the fourth largest in Japan after Nintoku, Ojin and Richu kofun. Though its occupant is unknown, the size of the mound indicates a very important clan figure in bygone Kibi.

More ancient sites carry the line all the way into the Yamato region, and the ancestral connection with sunset on summer solstice is shown again around the holy hill of Mt Miwa, from where the winter solstice sun sets behind Unebiyama, evidently associated with death or the ancestors in some way because of the number of tombs to be found around it.

Kurozumi's research continued in its path of discovery. He found more kofun and iwakura, not marked on the map, falling upon the Way of the Sun in Kibi, and it seemed there could be no doubt that the ability and will to plot such an alignment existed in ancient Japan. He reasoned that it could have been done quite simply, using just one stick planted in the ground and its shadow. By observing and marking the extreme points of the shadow during the morning and afternoon, an east-west line can be determined. Moreover, a line drawn from the bottom of the stake to a point midway between these maximum extents will give a north-south line. Kurozumi was impressed that these ancient people had found this precise way of determining and marking direction, and Prof. Yamada has noted that an east-west direction appears to have been the dominant orientation in central and western Japan, while further north, in the Tohoku region, a north-south orientation is more apparent. This may be an effect of the northern direction of the early Japanese people's migration through the country, as well as reflecting the differing axes of those two parts of Japan, and the question is raised whether these lines of orientation played an important role in the siting of settlements and tombs in ancient Japan.

Back in Kibi, Kurozumi's research continues, as he walks the hills of the area. (This article first appeared in the Asahi Shinbun, Japan, 14-11-81)

1. The Yamato Plain is the part of central Japan, around Nara, where the dominant clans of the country were based from around the third century CE onwards, and which later became the country's capital in the sixth century. It therefore had a vitally important political role in protohistoric Japan. JB 2. The Yayoi period of Japanese prehistory was from c.300 BC c.300 CE and is considered the formative period of Japanese cultural tradition and language. It saw the introduction of wet rice agriculture, iron tools and in its later phases irrigation systems; it was probably the time when the rites and beliefs that later came to be called Shinto, 'the way of the many gods', took more formal shape among the independent clans of the country. JB

3. Iwakura, 'stone store house', is the old term used to denote sacred stones and outcrops, in which Japan is very rich. JB

4. Kofun is the name of the large mounded tombs which originated in the Yayoi period and, developed into huge keyhole shaped mounds for clan chiefs, became the defining characteristic of the religious and political life of the ensuing protohistoric Kofun period. JB

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