Dōtaku

Dōtaku (銅鐸^?) are Japanese bells smelted from relatively thin bronze and richly decorated.

Dotaku were used for about 400 years, between the second century B.C. and the second century C.E. (corresponding to the end of the Yayoi era), and were nearly only used as decorations for rituals. They were richly decorated with patterns representing nature and animals, among which the dragonfly, praying mantis and spider are featured. Historians believe that dōtaku were used to pray for good harvests, as the animals featured are natural enemies of insect pests that attack paddy fields.

According to Japanese folklore, dōtaku were used as emergency bells (such as a watch tower’s bell); intended especially in cases of invasion, particularly invaders from the Korean peninsula. When sentinels spotted invaders, they loudly rang the dōtaku as an alarm, so that people could hide themselves or their possession, and to alert warriors to prepare themselves to repel the enemy.

There is a dotaku museum devoted to the bells in Yasu city, in Shiga prefecture, in central Japan.

During the Yayoi Era (400 B.C.E. – 300 C.E.), a great number of technological innovations occurred. Unlike the earlier nomadic Jomon people, the Yayoi emphasized having large community settlements and the cultivation of rice. Along with these, they learned how to cast bronze and iron in order to create various metal objects such as weapons, mirrors, and several tools. Among the bronze objects, dotaku, one of the most distinctive objects of the era, were created. In recent years, dotaku have been studied by researchers in order to decipher their origins, how they were created, their various purposes, and the reasons for the images on the main body.

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