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Japan’s newest Unesco World Heritage Site, the Jomon prehistoric ruins, could draw tourists back to the Tohoku region, devastated by 2011 quake and tsunami

  • The Jomon ruins encompass 17 archaeological sites in northern Japan and include the remains of stone circles and villages, some of which have been reconstructed
  • A hunter-gatherer society that flourished for 10,000 years, the Jomon take their name from the unique patterns on their pottery

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Visitors look at a reconstructed Jomon house at the Sannai Maruyama archeological site in northern Japan, one of 17 that have collectively been inscribed on Unesco’s World Heritage List. The listing has renewed hopes of reviving tourism in the Tohoku region. Photo: Getty Imags
Steve PowellandAngeles Marin Cabello
This summer, while the world was engrossed in the battle for the top of the medals table at the spectator-less Tokyo Olympics, Japan quietly received a different kind of award. On July 27, Unesco announced that the Jomon archaeological sites in northern Japan had been added to its august list of World Heritage Sites. They became Japan’s 20th Unesco “property” (as sites or groups of sites are known) but the first prehistoric one.
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The Jomon property comprises 17 Neolithic sites scattered across the prefectures of Aomori, Iwate and Akita, in the Tohoku area of Honshu and on the northern island of Hokkaido. They provide insight into the lives of a hunter-gatherer society that flourished in Japan for more than 10,000 years, following the last Ice Age, from around 14,500 BCE to 300 BCE.

News of the Unesco listing was welcomed by the people of the Tohoku region. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated the area and Tohoku had been counting on the Tokyo Olympics to bring a large number of visitors to help revive the local economy. The coronavirus pandemic prevented that, but Unesco’s decision has raised hopes that, someday soon, the influx of tourists may still arrive.

“It’s a result that we had been waiting a long time for,” says Masahiko Hananoki, director of a museum dedicated to the Oyu Kanjo Resseki site, a pair of large stone circles in Akita. “I hope that helps to revitalise our region.”

Remains of a large stone circle at the Oyu Kanjo Resseki site, part of the Jomon monument. Photo: Jomon Archives
Remains of a large stone circle at the Oyu Kanjo Resseki site, part of the Jomon monument. Photo: Jomon Archives

“Being listed by Unesco is not our end goal,” says Fumitaka Sato, a member of an NGO dedicated to raising public interest in the Sannai Maruyama site, the ruins of a settlement near Aomori City. “We want to cooperate with the other regions about these ancient remains, to share the Jomon era’s appeal.”

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