Cleveland Museum of Art

Haniwa Figure of a Female

Date

500s

Medium

earthenware with traces of pigment

Culture

Japan, Kofun period (300–710 CE)

Department

Japanese Art

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

Figures in a variety of dress including military and ceremonial garb start to appear on Japanese earthen mounded tombs called old mounds ( kofun ) from the 400s to 500s CE. This fragment depicts a woman with red triangles on her face and wearing jewelry. Archaeologists speculate that the facial markings had a ritual or symbolic function, perhaps indicating she is a female shaman. Many figures of this kind have been found in digs in the Kanto region of eastern Japan. We can only guess at the meaning of the clay cylinders called haniwa .

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