Sharin-seki
{{Short description|Type of Japanese archaeological artefact}}
{{Italic title}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2025}}
File:MET DT253025.jpg ({{convert|21.6 x 19.4 x 2.9|cm}})
(Metropolitan Museum of Art){{cite web |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/45537 |title=Carriage-wheel stone bracelet (sharinseki) |publisher=Metropolitan Museum of Art |access-date=27 February 2025}}{{cite book |title=The Archaeology of Japan: From the Earliest Rice Farming Villages to the Rise of the State |author-last=Mizoguchi |author-first=Kōji |author-link=Koji Mizoguchi |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2013 |ISBN=978-0-521-88490-7 |page=cover}}]]
{{nihongo|Sharin-seki|車輪石}}, sometimes translated literally as "carriage-wheel stones" or alternatively as "wheel-shaped stones",{{cite web |url=https://www.aisf.or.jp/~jaanus/deta/k/kushiro.htm |title=kushiro 釧 |publisher=Japanese Architecture and Art Net Users System |access-date=27 February 2025}} are a type of archaeological artefact known from early- to mid-Kofun period Japan.
Overview
Sharin-seki take the form of a stone bracelet with radial fluting. They have been known as such since the Edo period,{{cite web |url=https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/548945 |script-title=ja:車輪石 |trans-title=Sharin-seki |language=ja |publisher=Agency for Cultural Affairs |access-date=27 February 2025}} due to their resemblance to a spoked wheel.{{cite web |url=https://www.city.kobe.lg.jp/culture/culture/institution/center/relics/art/details/65.html |script-title=ja:腕輪形石製品 |trans-title=Bracelet-shaped Stone Artefacts |language=ja |publisher={{ill|Kobe Archeology Center|ja|神戸市埋蔵文化財センター}} |access-date=27 February 2025}} Their development has been traced back to the shell bracelets and/or armlets that originated in the Yayoi period,{{cite journal |url=https://rekihaku.repo.nii.ac.jp/records/1157 |script-title=ja:考古学からみた聖俗二重首長制 |trans-title=An Archaeological View of the Dual System of Religious and Secular Chieftainship |language=ja |author=Shiraishi, Taichirō |journal=Bulletin of the National Museum of Japanese History |volume=108 |pages=93–118 |date=31 October 2003}}{{cite web |url=https://u-sacred-heart.repo.nii.ac.jp/record/1538/files/ron7-eibuntekiyo_-1-10-.pdf |title=Sharin-seki and Kuwagata-ishi |author=Harada, Yoshito |publisher=University of the Sacred Heart, Tokyo |pages=6–7 |access-date=27 February 2025}} those of the Strombidae family from the seas to the south, around Amami Ōshima and the Ryūkyūs beyond, being particularly prized.{{cite web |url=https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/405257 |script-title=ja:鍬形石 |trans-title=Kuwagata-ishi |language=ja |publisher=Agency for Cultural Affairs |access-date=27 February 2025}} Often made of jasper, they imitate shells such as those of Scutellastra optima, a limpet in the Patellidae family.{{cite web |url=https://collection.kyuhaku.jp/gallery/36178.html |script-title=ja:車輪石 |trans-title=Sharin-seki |language=ja |publisher=Kyushu National Museum |access-date=27 February 2025}} Like shell "bracelets", bracelet-shaped stones may have been worn instead as pendants, although it is also possible these talismanic objects served primarily as grave goods.{{cite web |url=https://kojiki.kokugakuin.ac.jp/kibutsu/みそぎと神々の服装/車輪石/ |script-title=ja:車輪石 |trans-title=Sharin-seki |language=ja |publisher=Kokugakuin University |access-date=27 February 2025}} Similarities with Chinese jade bi may suggest continental influence, with glass bi known from northern Kyūshū.
Alongside kuwagata-ishi ("hoe-shaped stones") and {{ill|ishi-kushiro|qid=Q132795335}} ("stone bracelets"), sharin-seki are one of the three types of bracelet-shaped stone artefact known in large numbers from kofun of the early- to mid-Kofun period. Associating these objects with priests involved in kami-worship, archaeologist {{ill|Shiraishi Taichirō|ja|白石太一郎}} suggests that, in burials where large numbers are found, where accompanied with little in the way of weapons and armour, these relate to "magical-religious" leaders, likely women, whereas where found alongside weaponry and armour in significant quantities, we are dealing with chieftains with "priest-like power". Their absence from later burials may relate to the increasing cultural influence of contemporary China and the arrival of Buddhism.
National Treasures
A series of nineteen fourth-century jasper sharin-seki from {{ill|Tōdaijiyama Kofun|ja|東大寺山古墳}} in Tenri, Nara Prefecture, is among the assemblage of objects (including the Tōdaijiyama Sword) from the tumulus designated a National Treasure in 2017 and now at Tokyo National Museum.{{cite web |url=https://emuseum.nich.go.jp/detail?content_base_id=100619&content_part_id=37 |script-title=ja:車輪石 |trans-title=Wheel-shaped jasper |language=ja |publisher=National Institutes for Cultural Heritage |access-date=27 February 2025}}{{cite web |url=https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/201/00011754 |script-title=ja:奈良県東大寺山古墳出土品 |trans-title=Excavated Artefacts from Tōdaijiyama Kofun, Nara Prefecture |language=ja |publisher=Agency for Cultural Affairs |access-date=27 February 2025}}
Gallery
伝左山古墳 貝釧.JPG|Shell bracelets from {{ill|Denzayama Kofun|ja|伝左山古墳}}, Kumamoto Prefecture
松林山古墳出土 貝釧.JPG|Shell bracelets from {{ill|Shōrinzan Kofun|ja|松林山古墳}}, Shizuoka Prefecture
Scutellastra optima オオツタノハガイ.jpg|Scutellastra optima (Pilsbry, 1927), type locality: Yakushima{{cite journal |url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/8523275 |title=Patella stellæformis optima n. subsp. |author-last=Pilsbry |author-first=Henry Augustus |author-link=Henry Augustus Pilsbry |journal=The Nautilus |year=1927 |volume=40 |issue=4 |pages=138–9}}(Naturalis Biodiversity Center)
Han Jade Bi Disc 07.jpg|Han jade bi (Shanxi Museum)
東大寺山古墳出土 車輪石.JPG|Sharin-seki (NT) from {{ill|Tōdaijiyama Kofun|ja|東大寺山古墳}}, Nara Prefecture
カジヤ古墳 鍬形石・車輪石・石釧.JPG|Kuwagata-ishi, sharin-seki, and ishi-kushiro from {{ill|Kajiya Kofun|ja|カジヤ古墳}}, Kyoto Prefecture
MET 1975 268 386.jpeg|{{Circa}} 4th-century radially-grooved ishi-kushiro
(Metropolitan Museum of Art)
芝ヶ原古墳出土 銅釧.JPG|Bronze kushiro from Shibagahara Kofun, Kyoto Prefecture
MET 1975 268 388 210421.jpg|Back of the 4th-century sharin-seki above (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
See also
{{Commons category}}