
Atsuko Miyaji
Principal Investigator
Professor, Division of Humanities, Nara Women’s University
Project Overview
In this study, we will interdisciplinary examine how, in settlement sites with shell mounds from the initial Jomon period onward, when it became possible to obtain fishery resources stably, a different residential pattern from that of the Paleolithic period began, and although there was an opportunity for changes in the relationship with animals, they did not go so far as to domesticate them, in relation to the outbreak of infectious diseases. The period we will focus on is mainly the Jomon and Yayoi periods. In this study, we will conduct collaborative research with zooarchaeology, anthropology, ancient proteomics, ancient DNA, and isotope analysis to understand the uniqueness of the animal domestication process in the Japanese archipelago, which was about 10,000 years behind other regions in the world.
This study attempts to understand acute fatal infectious diseases that have not been recognized in previous studies by two completely new approaches: 1) archaeological excavation conditions and zooarchaeological analysis of Sus genus (age, diet, etc.), and 2) detection of infectious disease traces (viruses, bacteria, etc.) from animal remains and human bones excavated from the same site and shell mound. We place emphasis on the perspective of self-domestication of Sus genus excavated from Jomon and Yayoi period settlements and shell mounds. After the Jomon period, as the concentration of humans increased, it is highly likely that wild animals came to forage for discarded waste around the settlements, and a commensal relationship may have developed.
By considering the possibility that wild animals, which had become closer to humans physically, caused some kind of disadvantage to village members, we aim to clarify the reasons why keeping animals as pets was not actively adopted in the prehistoric Japanese archipelago.


