Kumamoto Prefecture built a museum on the theme of decorative ancient tombs as the central facility of Higo Kodai-no-Mori open-air museum stretching along the Kikuchi River running through Yamaga City and Nagomi Town. Higo Kodai-no-Mori is designated as one of the Fudoki-no-Oka open-air museums. Fudoki-no-Oka is a quasi-national open-air museum focusing on the remains of ancient civilization to preserve and utilize important historical remains and documents. About 200 of 700 decorative ancient tombs across Japan have been found here, so this area is thought to be the mother place of them. Japan’s first decorative ancient tombs were born here utilizing the pigment from the iron oxide produced by the volcanic activity of Mt. Aso. The inner part of the tombs here were painted with red pigment
in the 5th to the 7th century, then this way of decoration was developed to the east of Japan. On the stone walls of burial chamber in particular, weapons animals and human figures are beautifully depicted. The first photo shows Iwahara cluster of ancient tombs built in the 5th century, which is dotted with 13 decorative ancient tombs. The second one is the central museum facility designed by a world-famous architect, Tadao Ando.
Jason Hardy
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