By TAKASHI AZUMA/ Staff Writer
November 19, 2021 at 07:00 JST
TOTTORI--The face that gazes out at the world is of a middle-aged man who lived in Japan around 1,800 years ago.
Researchers reproduced the facial features from a skull dating from the Yayoi Pottery Culture Period (1000 B.C.-A.D. 250) unearthed at the Aoya Kamijichi archaeological site here.
The No. 8 skull is one of a number of human remains from the latter half of the Yayoi Period at the government-designated historic site.
The skull contained the largest amount of brain matter, and its DNA was well-preserved. It was chosen for the reproduction project supervised by Kazuhiro Sakaue, head of the Division of Human Evolution at the National Museum of Nature and Science.
Researchers started out by making a replica of the skull with a 3-D printer so clay could be applied to recreate skin. A mold was then developed based on the replica, which was filled with a plastic material to create the face.
Finally, strands of thick hair were transplanted onto the head as the DNA analysis suggested that was the way the man had looked.
The facial reproduction was unveiled at the end of October at the Torigin Bunka Kaikan hall in Tottori in the presence of many prominent scholars in archaeology and anthropology.
They included Naruya Saito, a professor at the National Institute of Genetics; Kenichi Shinoda, director of the National Museum of Nature and Science; Shinichiro Fujio, a professor at the National Museum of Japanese History; and Akira Seike, an archeological professor at Okayama University.
In his greeting, Tottori Governor Shinji Hirai explained the appeal of the Aoya district.
“Ancient ruins here evoke a sense of romance,” he said.
The facial replica, which was shown at the Aoya Kyodokan museum in Tottori, will also go on display at the prefectural Mukibanda Ruins Historical Park in Daisen, Tottori Prefecture, from Dec. 4 through Dec. 19.
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The facial reproduction of a middle-aged man who lived in the late Yayoi Pottery Culture Period (1000 B.C.-A.D. 250) was created from a skull shown in the poster behind. (Takashi Azuma)
