Itokoku History Museum

 

The Itokoku History Museum is somewhat larger than your average local history museum as it is in an area with many, many important, ancient archeological sites.

Being the closest part of the Japanese islands to mainland Asia, where people, culture, and technology were introduced from, northern Kyushu is in many ways the cradle of Japanese culture and history.

Not far from here in Karatsu is the site of the earliest evidence of rice-paddies in Japan, and the earliest records of Japan from China mention northern Kyushu. Close to this museum is the Hirabaru Burial Site, and ancient tomb from where many of the items in the museum has been exacavated.

Bronze mirrors are an important archeological marker in ancient Japan. Originally based in Daoist magic, in Japan they are  seen as important status-markers. The most famous bronze mirrors are a group of 100 given by the Chinese Emperor to the legendary Japanese Queen Himiko. She would then have given on many of these to important figures who supported her, and so on. Eventually these bronze mirrors were also produced in Japan.

In Japanese archeology, the presence of mirrors in grave goods is a marker of the importance of the person buried. The bigger the mirrors, and the quantity of mirrors, indicating the status. At the nearby Hirabaru site they discovered not only the largest number of mirrors at a single site, but also the biggest mirror ever found. In recent years a bigger mirror has been discovered near Nara, but it seems to be most unusual. What is clear is that the "king" who lived here was very, very powerful.

There is some English with the displays, and a lot of the museum is aimed at children, but if you are interested in ancient Japanese history, the museum is worth a visit.

The previous post in this series on my walk along the Kyushu Pilgrimage was on nearby Sazareishi Shrine.