"Hokkaido's largest stone circle, preserved beneath the highway that nearly destroyed it"
Washinoki Stone Circle
Mori, Hokkaidō, Japan
Beneath a highway tunnel in southwestern Hokkaido lies Japan's largest stone circle, a 4,000-year-old Jomon burial site that was nearly destroyed by modern construction. Discovered in 2003, the Washinoki Stone Circle contains 602 carefully arranged stones in a double-ring formation, with outer stones aligned on their long axes and inner stones pointing toward the center. The volcanic ash that buried it for centuries preserved evidence of sophisticated ritual architecture.
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Quick Facts
Location
Mori, Hokkaidō, Japan
Tradition
Site Type
Coordinates
42.1161, 140.5263
Last Updated
Jan 21, 2026
Washinoki Stone Circle was constructed approximately 4,000 years ago by Jomon people living in southern Hokkaido. The Late Jomon period saw the development of sophisticated ceremonial practices, including the construction of stone circles that served as communal cemeteries. Washinoki represents the largest of these in Hokkaido, demonstrating cultural connections with similar sites in northern Tohoku across the Tsugaru Strait.
Origin Story
No written records exist from the Jomon period, and no continuous oral tradition connects to this specific site. What we know comes from the stones themselves and the material culture preserved with them.
The Jomon people who built Washinoki lived as hunter-fisher-gatherers, drawing sustenance from the forests, rivers, and seas of their region. This economic pattern persisted for over 10,000 years in the Japanese archipelago, far longer than agricultural societies have existed anywhere on Earth. Within this long continuity, the Late Jomon period saw increasing investment in ceremonial architecture, including the stone circles that mark the landscape of Hokkaido and northern Tohoku.
The choice of location—a river terrace about one kilometer from Uchiura Bay—placed the burial ground in relationship to both land and sea. The bay provided marine resources; the rivers provided freshwater; the forests provided game and plants. The stone circle marked a place within this sustaining landscape where the dead would rest and the living would gather to honor them.
The 602 stones were brought from elsewhere—exactly where is not fully documented, but moving stones of this number and size required sustained community effort. The arrangement shows careful planning: the double-ring structure, the alignment of outer stones on their long axes, the pointing of inner stones toward the center. This was sacred geometry, encoding meaning that we can observe but not fully interpret.
Spiritual Lineage
Washinoki belongs to the Late Jomon tradition of stone circle construction, which produced similar sites across Hokkaido and northern Tohoku. The cultural connections across the Tsugaru Strait demonstrate that Jomon peoples maintained relationships across considerable distances, sharing practices for honoring the dead within stone-marked sacred ground. No continuous tradition connects modern peoples to the specific practices at Washinoki. The Jomon population eventually gave way to new peoples and cultures—the Ainu in Hokkaido, the Yamato culture farther south. Yet patterns visible in Jomon practice—ancestor veneration, the marking of sacred ground, the creation of ceremonial landscapes—anticipate patterns in later Japanese religious traditions. The archaeological study of Washinoki began with its discovery in 2003 and continues through its role in the UNESCO World Heritage property. The site contributes to scholarly understanding of Jomon ceremonial architecture and the spread of stone circle traditions across northern Japan.
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