Yoshimi Hyakuana

Little knownBarely documented in English. This is the kind of place the site exists for.

Researched and written by Hinato

Yoshimi Hyakuanatomb cavesKofun periodluminous mosswartime tunnels

Photo: さかおり / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0) · original

What sets Yoshimi Hyakuana apart from other natural sites in Saitama is how much depends on conditions outside anyone's control.

A hillside outside Yoshimi is drilled with 219 openings, cut into the soft tuff between the late sixth and late seventh centuries as tombs. Each chamber held a family group and the arrangement across the slope is dense enough that the hill looks industrial rather than funerary. When they were first excavated in 1887 the excavator concluded they were the dwellings of a race of dwarfs, a theory that held for decades before the burial goods settled it.

A few of the chambers hold luminous moss, a nationally designated natural monument that glows faintly green in the low light at the mouth of the openings. There is a second and much later layer: in 1944 and 1945 a large underground armaments factory was tunnelled through the same hill, and its three-metre openings sit among the burial caves at the base of the slope.

What to know before you go

Access hours

8:45 AM – 4:50 PM (last entry 4:30 PM)

Closed: Open year-round

When to go

Year-round | Spring and autumn for comfortable climbing on the slope

Fee

¥300 junior high school students and over | ¥200 elementary school | Free below elementary school

Time to allow

1–1.5 hours

Getting there

Directions

Kitayoshimi 324, Yoshimi Town, Hiki District. By car from Kawagoe; buses run from Higashi-Matsuyama Station. Admission ¥300 for junior high school students and over, ¥200 elementary school, free below that. The slope is climbed on steep steps and several chambers can be entered by crouching.

Beyond the guidebook

**Some chambers can be entered.** Crouching, on hands and knees for a couple of them. The interiors have carved beds along the walls, which is the detail that makes them read as tombs rather than holes. **The luminous moss is in specific chambers and is signposted.** It needs the low indirect light at the mouth of a cave to show, and photographing it without ruining it means no flash. **The 1944 factory tunnels are at the base.** Three-metre bores driven through the same hill by conscripted labour to move aircraft-engine production underground. Partly accessible and much less visited than the tombs above. **They were thought to be dwarf houses until the 1920s.** The 1887 excavator proposed a race of small people lived in them, and the idea persisted. The tomb interpretation came from the grave goods. **Steep steps up the slope.** Not step-free anywhere and the stone is worn. Sensible shoes. **Iwadono Kannon is nearby.** A cliff temple in a ravine, free, and almost nobody there.

View on Google Maps