Aerial view of Saitobaru Kofun Group

　Saitobaru Kofun Group is located on a plateau on the western side of Saitobaru City, spread over a broad area approximately 4.2 km north-south and 2.6 km east-west. In fact, this kofun group comprises of multiple ancillary groups of burial mounds located on Saitobaru Plateau at an elevation of around 60 – 70 m, areas of intermediate plateau land at an elevation of around 20 – 60 m, and areas of alluvial plain at an elevation of around 10 m. There are a total of 319 extant mounds, including 31 keyhole-shaped burial mounds, 2 square burial mounds, 1 scallop-shaped burial mound, and 285 circular burial mounds. This total rises even more when including those underground tunnel tombs and tunnel tombs that have been discovered to date, along with kofun that have been flattened and no longer exist. Needless to say, this is the largest kofun group in southern Kyushu.

Saitobaru Mound №81

　This kofun group is thought to have been established from around the time when Mound 21 (mound length: approx. 54 m) was built, a keyhole-shaped burial mound constructed during the end of the 3rd century to the first half of the 4th century (Early Kofun). During the first half of the 5th century (first half of the Middle Kofun), Osahozuka (length: 176 m), the largest scallop-shaped burial mound in Japan, and Mesahozuka, the largest keyhole-shaped burial mound in Kyushu (mound length: 176 m), were constructed in Maruyama Ancillary Kofun Group in the western area of the plateau. By the start of the 6th century (Late Kofun), the construction of large keyhole-shaped burial mounds ceased at Saitobaru Kofun Group, and the main focus of kofun production switches to Nyutabaru Kofun Group on the opposite bank of the Hitotsuse River. However, from the latter half of the 6th century, mounded tombs of a scale befitting clan chiefs were once again built here, in this case the keyhole-shaped burial mound Mound No.202 (Himezuka; mound length: 57 m), and the circular burial mound Mound No.206 (Oninoiwaya Kofun; mound length: 36 m).

Saitobaru Mound №206 (Oninoiwaya Kofun)

　Excavations are currently ongoing as part of site maintenance work being carried out by Miyazaki Prefectural Board of Education, and are yielding much useful information. In addition, facilities have been put in place to allow visitors to experience these burial mounds as they were at the time of their construction, and to actually look around the inside of these archaeological features for themselves.
　Saitobaru Kofun Group was designated as a National Historical Site in 1934, and as a Special Historical Site in 1952.
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