Muromachi Period, 15th century
H. 20.9, MD. 9.7, TD. 19.0, BD. 14.0
Hyakusaiji Temple, Shiga
This small jar was excavated in 1951 from the "heart stone" foundation of the five-story pagoda remains of the Shakazan Hyakusaiji temple in AitoOchoO, Echigun, Shiga Prefecture. This ancient temple is said to have been built upon the orders of ShoOtoku Taishi. The mouth of this jar has a very slight outward turn and is double layered, with the irregular, non-right-left symmetric body made of coiled clay construction. The irregular form results in one sloping shoulder and one swelling shoulder. An incised cypress fence pattern circles the shoulder area, but different stroke handling was used to create the two rows of horizontal lines and the diagonal lines of the crosses. Spatula marks remain from the forming of this jar, and overall it reveals an artless construction method. The clay with feldspar and silica inclusions has been well fired with the side which faced the fire burned to a red color and the feldspar fragments melted and protruding. Originally a considerable amount of a
shes fell on the pot in the firing, melting to create a bold swath of bright green glaze, but the long years of burial in the earth has meant that this glaze has been worn away to white, dried surface. Adhesions remain in the glaze at the bottom edge of the torso. Wheel spur marks remain on the base of the jar. Several types of inscribed characters remain in the upper area of the incised pattern, resembling the letters N, V and a\mark. Grains of glass were placed in the pot and it is thought to have been buried as a reliquary.
This pot was excavated from the site of heart-stone of a five-storied pagoda which had previously been thought to have been built in the Kamakura period and hence had been used as a standard work representing the Kamakura period. However, historical records indicate that Hyakusaiji was destroyed by fire four times, and among those four incidents, the temple's pagoda was destroyed by fire on two occasions, in MeioO 7 (1498) and again in Bunki 3 (1503). Further, reports on the excavation of the pagoda site reveal that this pot was unearthed from the top layer of burned soil, and thus it is thought that this pot was excavated from the heart-stone site of the five-storied pagoda built between the years 1498 and 1503. (See ChuOsei no Shigaraki\sono jitsuzoO to hennen o saguru mMedieval Shigaraki\searching for its true nature and chronologyn, Shiga Prefectural OOmi Fudokinooka Museum, 1989.)
The box for this pot includes a text which records the events of its excavation. As this is the first publication of this document, we have included its full text here.
Discovery of Jar in Pagoda Ruins
Showa 26 (1951)
Unearthing a Relic Jar
Based on the fact that the religious treasures of Shakazan Hyakusaiji were to be put on display for the one week period from April 12, 1951 through April 18th, a guide to Hyakusaiji was created at the end of 1950 and the Sakamoto calligrapher Itakura Muneyoshi inscribed the characters "ShoOtoku Taishi GosonsoO toOji no gojuO no toO ato" on a piece of cypress wood, 8 sun square (approx. 24.24 cm) and 1 joO and 5 shaku in length (approx. 454.5 cm), (inscribed at dusk on the 10th of March.) On the 13th of March (carpenter Kawakami Kamekichi), Fujisawa SotojiroO, Fujisawa YoshizoO, Kawase RiichiroO, and Yamamoto SataroO decided to erect this explanatory sign for the five-story pagoda remains. In order to choose a location for this sign, we used the remaining foundation stones for the pagoda's pillars as a guide (four, three and three, respectively on the west, south and north sides of the pagoda) and dug in the middle of the area bounded by those stones. When we had dug approxim
ately 1 shaku and 5 sun (approx. 45.45 cm) from the earth's surface we encountered a flat stone. SotojiroO removed this flat stone, we realized that this flat stone was in use as the lid of a jar, and we then looked into this jar. The jar was about half full of dirt and water which had seeped into the jar. Careful not to disturb the dirt surrounding the jar, we brought the jar to the surface and in order to not lose the form of the jar which had split into several pieces, SataroO carefully held the jar with both hands and they quietly descended the mountain and placed the jar in the abbot's quarters. The following day, the priest (Hamanaka KoOtetsu) and I (Yamamoto SataroO) worked together on the jar. The priest poured water onto the jar to remove the dirt which had clung to the jar. I carefully scooped the dirt in the jar into a wash basin. I poured water onto the dirt and let it wash away slowly, until gradually a few rice-grain sized particles of a mineral of a lapis lazuli col
or remained. The priest washed and purified these fragments and placed the unearthed particles on top of a sanboO offering stand. We then put a small amount of the dirt from the jar into the wash basin and poured yet more water over it, repeating this process until we had removed the following items.
1. Several rice-grain sized particles of lapis lazuli color
2. Ten or more rice-grain sized particles of either glass, or amber or crystal
3. 1 sesame-grain sized particle of pure gold
For a total of 20 objects.
On the 17th day of March Mr. Uno, the archaeologist of the Shiga Prefectural Art Museum, visited the temple to return the Shakazan temple's Maitreya Bodhisattva image. He viewed the excavated materials and he stated that this was a major find unparalleled in recent years and he would plan to publish them in scholarly circles in the near future. He then took three photographs of the jar, the stone base of the jar and the stone lid of the jar.
Mr. Uno explained that :
1. The jar was of early period Shigaraki manufacture and dated to the early Kamakura period.
2. The 20 objects in the jar were objects of worship believed to be holy relics.
3. It was rare to find excavated items in the OOmi area from sites dated to the Kamakura period and that objects from the same period had been excavated at Ishiyama-dera.
April 1951
confirmed by Yamamoto SataroO, a representative of the worshippers of Shakazan
(from the excavation record kept in the box for the jar)
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