Wooden coffin - Mokkan

A general term for wooden containers for storing remains. They are classified into hollowed-out and assembled types based on the manufacturing method, with the basic hollowed-out type being a split-bamboo-shaped wooden coffin and the assembled type being a box-shaped wooden coffin. The use of wooden coffins during the Yayoi period was presumed based on traces of the shape of the coffin remaining in pits, but in the 1960s box-shaped wooden coffins were excavated one after another at ruins in Tano, Amagasaki City, Hyogo Prefecture; Katsube, Toyonaka City, Osaka Prefecture; Ama, Takatsuki City; and Uryuudo, Higashiosaka City. These ruins were low-lying settlements, and the wooden coffins were buried in cemeteries adjacent to the settlements, so they were preserved by groundwater. In the Kofun period, box-shaped wooden coffins were also used, but in the early Kofun tombs, mainly in the Kinai region, huge split-bamboo-shaped coffins up to 7-8 meters in length were widely used, which differ from the short wooden coffins of the Yayoi period. These long wooden coffins were made from Japanese cedar and only contained the remains of one person, so there is debate as to whether they were simply coffins or imitations of boats or something similar. In the middle and late Kofun period, short box-shaped wooden coffins were used, and in mass tombs just before the adoption of horizontal stone chambers, these were covered directly with piled earth, a method known as direct wooden coffin burial. Towards the end of the period, lacquered wooden coffins were also used, as in the Takamatsuzuka Kofun tomb.

[Kouichi Mori]

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

遺骸(いがい)を納める木製容器の総称。製作法によって刳抜(くりぬき)式と組合せ式とに分類され、基本的な形として刳抜式に割竹形木棺、組合せ式に箱式（形）木棺がある。弥生(やよい)時代に木棺が用いられていることは、土壙(どこう)に残る棺の形の痕跡(こんせき)によって推定されていたが、1960年代になって兵庫県尼崎(あまがさき)市田能(たの)、大阪府豊中(とよなか)市勝部、高槻(たかつき)市安満(あま)、東大阪市瓜生堂(うりゅうどう)などの遺跡で相次いで箱式木棺が発掘された。これらの遺跡は低地集落で、集落に接した墓地に木棺が埋められていたため、地下水によって保存された。古墳時代になると、箱式木棺も使われたが、畿内(きない)地方を中心とした前期古墳では、長さが7～8メートルに達する巨大な割竹形木棺が盛んに使われ、弥生時代の短い木棺と異なる。これらの長大な木棺の材質はコウヤマキで、また内部には1人の遺骸しか納めてないので、単なる棺か、それとも舟などを模倣したのか議論が分かれている。古墳時代の中・後期には短い箱式木棺が使用され、とくに横穴式石室採用直前の群集墳ではこれを直接盛土で覆っていて、それを木棺直葬(ちょくそう)とよぶ。終末期には高松塚古墳のように漆塗り木棺も使用されている。

［森　浩一］

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