LATE KOFUN PERIOD (6TH - 7TH CENTURY)

Haniwa, "clay ring," take their name from the unglazed clay cylinders placed on the large tomb mounds of the Japanese elite beginning in the fourth century. The tubular bases were sunk into the ground for stability. In the succeeding centuries, potters of the cylinders expanded into sculptures of humans, animals and household objects. The haniwa were fashioned by the coil and slab technique, smoothed with a bamboo comb and finished with a bamboo knife or spatula, then dried or fired at a low temperature, which resulted in their warm buff or reddish color.

For a similar figure excavated from Shiroyama, Komigawa City, Chiba Prefecture, see Kobayashi Yukio, ed., Haniwa, volume 25 of Nihon toji taikei (Compendium of Japanese ceramics) (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1990), no. 29.