Monograph No. 10

NARA IMPERIAL PALACE SITE AND OTHER HISTORICAL MONUMENTS ARCHAEOLOGICAL SURVEYS CARRIED OUT IN 1955. 1959

CONTENTS

Page

First Survey of Nara Imperial Palace Site

Chapter I. Outline of Survey            1

1. Introduction    1

2. Progress of Excavation 3

Chapter II. Sites  6

1. Corridor           6

2. Mud-walled Gallery        8

Chapter III. Artifacts         10

1. Tiles 10

2. Earthenware etc           11

3. Canopy-shaped Haniwa              11

Chapter IV. Studies           13

1. Dimensions of Buildings              13

2. Comparison with Fujiwara and Heian Palaces         13

3. Historical Study             15

Traditional Site of Asuka-Itabuki Imperial Palace

Chapter I. Outline of Survey            17

1. Introduction    17

2. Progress of Excavation  18

Chapter II. Sites  21

1. Southern Structural Remains      21

2. Western Structural Remains        22

3. Northern Structural Remains       24

Chapter III. Artificial and Natural Remains    25

1. Remains discovered from Palace Site        25

2. Remains antedating the erection of Palace            27

Chapter IV. Studies           30

1. Location of Asuka-Itabuki Palace              30

2. Studies on Structural Remains and Artifacts           31

Sonshoji Temple Site

Chapter I. Outline of Survey            37

1. Introduction    37

2. Circumstances that prompted Excavation 38

3. Progress of Excavation  38

Chapter II. Sites  40

1. Outline of Site and Strata            40

2. Buildings          41

3. Gutters and Well            41

Chapter III. Artifacts         44

1. Remains from Temple Site          44

2. Remains antedating the erection of Temple           48

Chapter IV. Studies           49

1. History of Temple          49

2. Street-planning in the Eastern Suburb of Heian Capital        50

3. Location and Precinct of Temple 51

4. Studies on Structural Remains    52

5. Studies on Artifacts       53

English Summary ix

 

NARA IMPERIAL PALACE SITE AND OTHER HISTORICAL MONUMENTS

FIRST SURVEY OF NARA IMPERIAL PALACE SITE

 NARA IMPERIAL PALACE SITE is situated at Saki-cho in the city of Nara, where the imperial domicile and halls of state stood from 710 to 784 A.D. The precinct is 1014m. square, almost all of which is now cultivated as paddy-field, except a rectangular section of 10 hectares, which is now national property and protected as an historical monument. This rectangular section of ground is the site of the Inner Court of the Palace where the ruined ground platforms of the Daigokuden ‐ the supreme hall of state ‐ and several lesser halls of state exist. Enhanced by the post-war trend of enthusiasm for archaeology, the long-cherished desire of historians and archaeologists to make a thorough investigation of the entire precinct of the palace was realized in 1954, when a project was established by which the annual survey would be continually conducted by the Nara National Research Institute of Cultural Properties. Under this programme, the first investigation was carried out from the 1st to the 20th of August, 1955, excavating a small quarter of ground, about 3 ares, at the south-eastern corner of the corridor enclosing the Daigokuden Hall.

 As the result of this survey, it became clear that the corridor enclosing the Daigokuden hall was a long gallery having three rows of pillars supporting its roof, architecturally termed “Fukuro” (複廊, or Double Corridor, as it had two parallel passage ways ). It also became clear that the gallery extending eastward from the corridor had a thick mud-wall between two rows of pillars, which is newly termed “Chikuenro” (築垣廊). The layout of the Daigokuden hall with enclosing corridor and connecting gallery shows quite a different aspect from those of the preceeding Fujiwara Palace (694-710 A.D.) and the succeeding Heian Palace (794-c. 1177). While the Fujiwara supreme hall was erected on the same ground level as the lesser halls, the supreme halls of both later palaces were erected on higher terraces than the rest. And again the supreme halls of both Fujiwara and Nara Palaces were shut off by corridors from the outer court, while the same edifice of the Heian Palace opened onto the front courtyard. The gradual changes in the layout and construction of the palace buildings seem to reflect an ideological development among the ruling aristocrats, who slowly came to realize the necessity and importance of an ostentatious display of the imperial authority.

 About 25% of the pillar-base stones unearthed in the surveyed area were once replaced. This fact suggests that the original hall was rebuilt or repaired before it finally disappeared by decay or destruction. There are two dates which seem likely for the repair or rebuilding. One is 745 A.D., when Emperor Shomu returned to Nara from Naniwa, where he had stayed for a short time. The other is 760 A.D. or thereabouts, when repairs to the palace are frequently referred to in the official chronicle. But the fundamental question of the date of the first establishment of the hall remains still unanswered, though several conjectures are possible, combining the different dates of erection and of rebuilding. The first of these supposes that the hall was first erected in or about 710 A.D., when the Capital was shifted to Nara from Fujiwara, and was rebuilt on the Emperor's return from Naniwa. The second places the date of first establishment of the hall in 745 A.D., and proposes 760 A.D. or thereabouts as the date of reconstruction. The third hypothesis differs from the first two in assuming that a hall of state, other than the Daigokuden, was erected at the first establishment of the palace, and was reconstructed in 760 A.D. or thereabouts and converted into the supreme hall. The tiles and other relics recovered from the site being dated at the latter half of the 8th century, the second conjecture appears to be the most convincing, though the other conjectures are not altogether unworthy of consideration. The solution of the problem must be postponed until after the completion of the investigation of the whole palace precinct.

 

TRADITIONAL SITE OF ASUKA-ITABUKI IMPERIAL PALACE

 The Imperial Palace of Asuka-Itabuki is famous for being the stage upon which the drama of the Taika Reform ‐ the most important political innovation in Japan’s ancient history ‐ was unfolded. Erected by Empress Kogyoku in the second year of her reign (643 A.D.), the palace existed until 655 A.D., when it was devasted by fire and abondoned. But the exact position of the site has been buried in oblivion, and there are several traditions as to its whereabouts, although none of them have been proved beyond question. A piece of land of about 13 hectares, with a small mound called Tategami-zuka at its center, situated at Oka, Asuka Vil., Takaichi County, Nara Prefecture, has been counted as one of the traditional sites of the palace and the neighboring peasants often encounter during cultivation the cobble-pavement under the paddy-field which they believe to have something to do with the remains of the imperial court or abode.

 In 1954, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry planned to construct an aqueduct for irrigating the Yamato Plain. Since the projected water channel was to be built through this area, fear was entertained by the Cultural Properties Protection Committee that the construction work might destroy the underground monuments. In order to clarify the nature of the remains and to find measures for protecting them from ruin, the staff of Nara National Research Institute of Cultural Properties undertook the excavation of the site. The survey was carried out from April 13th to May 31st, 1959.

 Limited in time and funds, the survey was far from satisfactory, revealing only a small part of the whole field. And yet the digging exposed three structural remains in the site, which will hereafter be referred to as the southern, northern and western remains. The southern remains is a long raised ground, with a row of pillars, equally spaced, on its axis line. The transverse gutters divide it into equal sections, each with four pillars. As nothing remains of the superstructures supported by the pillars, the dimensions, construction and purpose of the building remain problematical. The northern remains is an open ground, partly paved with cobbles and having three gutters running north-south and two gutters running east-west. The western remains is a site of a building, oblong in plan, having two rows of nine pillars each. These three structures are believed to be the ruins of buildings and courtyards constructed at the same time under a single plan and there are indications that similar remains are buried in the unexplored grounds near by.

 Potsherds form the bulk of artificial objects recovered from the site. An archaeological study of them, however, assigns their date to the end of the 7th or early 8th century and completely upsets the tradition that the area was the site of the Imperial palace in question, which existed about half a century earlier.

 Though the result of the present survey only served to prove the invalidity of this tradition, the group of structural remains brought to light, together with those still buried underground, is considered to form a quarter of residence or palace that was inhabited towards the end of the 7th and early 8th century, when the custom still survived for each reign to have its own seat of government. The chronicle of the time records that several imperial palaces were built in this part of the Yamato Plain ‐ the district of Asuka ‐ in the 7th and 8th centuries, and it is more than likely that the site is the remains of one of them.

 As the survey furnished testimony of the existence of important monuments in the area, it was decided to built the projected aqueduct around the site so as to save them from destruction.

 

SONSHOJI TEMPLE SITE

 A block of streets called Saishoji-cho, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto City is supposed to be the site of the Sonshoji Temple. The temple was established in 1102 A.D. by the command of Emperor Horikawa and was one of six similar temples erected side by side at the end of the Heian period. The temple was built on a grand plan, patterned after Kofukuji Temple of Nara, composed of large edifices and elegant pagodas. But shortly after its erection, the magnificient buildings were destroyed one by one earthquakes, fires and violent winds, and in the following Kamakura period, only a very few of its original buildings stood intact. At present nothing but its name remains. In 1959, the Kyoto Municipal authorities conceived the project of building a large assembly hall called the Kyoto Kaikan in the area, whose construction might involve the destruction of the monuments buried underground. By the support of the municipal authorities, the staff of Nara National Research Institute of Cultural Properties therefore excavated the site, parallel with the progress of the construction work.

 Since the surveyed area was restricted to the compound of the new hall, the entire layout of the temple was unfortunately not made clear. But the excavators’ spades laid bare remains of a building, having a ground platform, a well and five gutters in the western half of the site. Most of these gutters are connected with each other; some running true north-south and others true east-west. In the eastern half of the site, near Nijo Street, another ground platform of a building came to light. Its northern half was completely demolished without leaving a trace, but its remaining part' is bounded by sill-stones and pavement for eavesdrops, and its southern side is 21.8 m. long. The building that once stood on this ruined foundation is supposed to be one of the main structures of the temple ‐ most probably a pagoda.

 Tremendous quantities of roof tiles were discovered in and around the substructures. Most of them came from the kilns at Kitahataeda in the northern suburb of Kyoto and from the kilns in Tamba Province. The most striking feature of these tiles, however, is not their quantity but the innumerable variety of their decorative designs. There are more than 150 varieties in the design of round eave-tiles and as many in the design of plain eave-tiles. This unusually numerous variety of the decorative design of eave-tiles seems to indicate that in this temple the eaves of the buildings were decorated with tiles of miscellaneous designs, indiscriminately mixed. This is quite contrary to the usage followed by the architects of earlier times who adorned the eaves of a single building with a set of round and plain tiles, each of a single design. The demand for roof-tiles increased considerably in the later Heian period, when people, high and low, were fascinated by a new sect of Buddhism, and the members of the nobility vied with one another in building new temples and pagodas or in restoring old ones. The output of tile-kilns was too meager to cope with the demand and the shortage of supply forced the architects to use whatever tiles came to hand. This fact may account for the disorderly arrangement of eave-tiles, as seen in the building of this temple.

 The present survey, besides disclosing the remains of a Mediaeval Buddhist temple, sheds light also on the problem of street-planning in the suburbs of the Heian capital. Since the orientation of the newly discovered substructures generally coincides with that of the Heian capital proper, it is manifest that marking off of land was practiced even in the eastern suburb of the capital, east of the Kamo River, following the system applied to the central quarter. It was also discovered that Nijo Avenue in this area was 8 jo (丈 or 24m.) wide, whereas it was broader in the central part of the capital, and that the precinct of Sonshoji is 2 cho (町 or 240m.) square.

 

昭和三十六年三月三十一日 発行

奈良国立文化財研究所学報第十冊

平城宮跡第一次 伝飛鳥板蓋宮跡 発掘調査報告


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