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context: sculpture > early sculpture
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a haniwa figure, c.300-600 A.D. |
Haniwa
In the Kofun era, from 300-600 A.D., clay figures - humans, houses (see parent page), horses - were made for burial sites to substitute, so the books tend to say, for actual sacrifices. However there seems to be no evidence at all of the Japanese ever practising human sacrifice, so we can better treat it as another import from China that was detached from any original cause. The lower pipe part of these figures was inserted into the ground.