Ancient Whaling in Northwestern Kyushu

摘要

The paper aims to report on the archaeological studies of whales in northwestern Kyushu, but will first give a brief outline of neighboring areas. In the Japanese Archipelago, whales had been taken and eaten, and their bones used for various implements from thousands of years ago; namely, since the Jomon period, designating about ten thousand years in the history of Japan. There have been whale bones and artifacts made with bones unearthed in more than one hundred sites in Japan, and several dozens in Kyushu alone. However, I cannot give the exact number of sites since not all the excavated animal remains have been scientifically identified as whale bones.