What kind of life did the people who lived in Heijokyo live and what were they thinking about?
I would like to investigate from what was excavated.
Excavated items from Heijokyo
Heijo-kyo is the center of politics of a country, and various things such as inkstones, ink, and brushes, which are also work tools for various wooden tablets and officials, have been excavated.
But what about rural areas?
In fact, evidence that the characters have penetrated into rural areas has been found.
It seems that the name of the owner and the name of the place are written on the pottery, and the auspicious phrase (Kishoku =auspicious phrase) is written. Sumisho pottery is a pottery with letters and symbols written in this way. However, it is believed that the characters were written in a fairly wide area because many of these pottery were found in rural areas.
In other words, by this time, it is believed that the culture of writing letters had already spread to the general public to a considerable extent. The spread of this character culture is not unrelated to the nationwide enforcement of the Ritsuryo system.
There are still. Mokkan with country name, tax type, product name, sender, etc. , Goods brought to the city ( salt And lacquer Etc.) to Wadokaichin .. Sometimes tax tone ・ 庸 If you can't produce the products you want to pay in your own country, it seems that you may have sold the special products of that country and then bothered to buy the products required by the central government. As supplies and people gather, the city and accommodation facilities will develop. You can hear from the items excavated from the lively appearance of those days.
On the other hand, some items are not calm. A named doll with a nail in its chest, a plate with a chest that wants to be separated from a man, and so on. Cursed dolls were forbidden by law at the time, and if they were actually done, they could be sentenced to death at the highest. Also, at that time, the cause of disasters and illnesses was human sin . And dirty It has been believed to be in. These evil spirits and illnesses are transferred to the festival tools and flushed into the water to perform the ritual of purifying. Several of these purse and curse tools have been found in the drainage canals of Heijokyo.
The people who lived in Heijokyo were not only the central officials, but also the people who served there. With 300 servants in the Daijo-daijin and 100 servants in the first place, it can be imagined that many people would have lived in the mansions of some influential people. When other people in red live in the same mansion, there will be many things. The subtleties of the hearts of people around here do not seem to change.