Tohoku University and Museum of the Sakitama Ancient Burial Mounds, Saitama Prefecture have conducted a geophysical exploration using ground penetrating radar to understand scientifically theinner structures of Okunoyama tumulus in March 2009. The research has been conducted as part of Sakitama tumulus maintenance and restoration project including a research on Okunoyama tumulus. The research group has discovered structures that seemed to be stone burial facilities called box-type stone coffin, considering its size and a construction time of the tumulus. After an analysis of experimental data, the discoveries might have been box-type stone coffins or wooden coffins buried three meters below the highest point of the mound.

More Information (Japanese)

[Contact]

Professor Motoyuki Sato

Assistant Professor Manabu Watanabe

Center for Northeast Asian Studies, Tohoku University

Tel: +81-22-795-6075