Welcome to the Umenoki Archaeological Site in Central Japan | Jomon Period | Japan

This archaeological site was occupied approximately 5,000 years ago by bands of Jōmon hunter-gatherers who lived here for a total of about 500 years. We are not sure why the site was abandoned, but our best guess is that access to local food sources such as chestnuts may have been impacted by the global climate event known in palaeoclimatology as the 4.2-kiloyear event. The event was one of the most severe climatic events of the Holocene epoch characterized by dry and cool climatic conditions in many parts of the world and is believed to have played an important role in the collapse of major ancient civilizations.

There are approximately 150 former pit dwellings that have been identified at Umenoki, with only 10% excavated so far. The excavation project, which was mostly undertaken by volunteers, took 4 years to complete and we believe that we currently only have about 1% of the potential artifacts on display in our museum’s reception center. Most of the artifacts were found at a depth of about 30 to 40 cm. As the site is on the side of a hill, silt would have been constantly eroded making it possible to find artifacts quite easily. It is certain that there are many more sites still to be found, but those in the valley below could be located several meters below the modern land surface, making them all but impossible to find.