Toro Ruins

Last week we went to the Toro Ruins, which are the archaeological remains of a small village from the late Yayoi period (100-300AD). There are reconstructions of several rice storage buildings, and family round-houses, as well as a museum. Because of flooding, the rice is stored several metres above ground, and the houses are slightly raised with moats around them.

Apart from the reconstructed buildings, the museum provides reconstructed versions of their tools, foods, clothes, etc, so that you can actually try them all out! You can see how they made and used their tools, some of which are very clever, like their fire-starter (kind of like a weighted spinning top with a string and handle attached to rev it up with). I found grinding the rice in their mortars(to separate the seeds from the stalks) to be a lot easier than I thought it would be too.

The original artefacts are on display too, and whenever I see things like this I alway wonder about the actual person who used that very same thing so long ago...