Dendrochronological Dating Of Vernacular Folk Crafts In Northern Central Japan
Affiliation
Botanical Gardens, Tohoku UniversityNational Institute for Cultural Properties Nara, Nara 630-8577, Japan
Issue Date
2008-12Keywords
DendrochronologyTree Rings
Japanese Beech
Vernacular Folk Craft
Tree-Ring Dating
Folkloric Record
Central Japan
Metadata
Show full item recordRights
Copyright © Tree-Ring Society. All rights reserved.Collection Information
This item is part of the Tree-Ring Research (formerly Tree-Ring Bulletin) archive. For more information about this peer-reviewed scholarly journal, please email the Editor of Tree-Ring Research at editor@treeringsociety.org.Publisher
Tree-Ring SocietyJournal
Tree-Ring ResearchCitation
Hoshino, Y., Okochi, T., Mitsutani, T., 2008. Dendrochronological dating of vernacular folk crafts in northern Central Japan. Tree-Ring Research 64(2):109-114.Abstract
We dated vernacular folk crafts (traditional snow shovels) made of beech wood (Fagus crenata Bl.) in north-central Japan. A raw chronology was constructed for the folk crafts, spanning the period from 1721 to 1953 (233 years). The raw chronology was crossdated using a reference chronology in central Japan. Eventually, tree-ring dates were confidently determined for 26 out of 44 samples. The final tree-ring dates of the folk crafts ranged between 1872 and 1953. We used oral folkloric records collected in a public survey for comparison and verification of our results. The time period of use of the folk crafts was supposed to range between the late Meiji Period and the beginning of the Pacific War (World War II), and the tree-ring dates were generally consistent with the date range. However, the final tree-ring dates were after the Pacific War for two youngest samples, showing better agreement with the historical change in industry of modern Japan. The tree-ring dates demonstrate the potential to describe the historical use of the artifacts more accurately than the folkloric records. In addition, the existing site chronology of Japanese beech has been better replicated using the folk craft samples. The chronology can possibly be further extended using archaeological wood from historical buildings.ISSN
2162-45851536-1098