Tsunami stone tablet

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Tsunami stone tablets ( Jap. 大津浪記念碑 , Ōtsunami kinenhi ) are known as "tsunami stones," often blackboard like-worked and inscribed stelae in coastal areas of Japan that the extent of flooding by previous tsunami Show catastrophes.

History and function

Some of the tsunamist stone tablets scattered across the Japanese coast are 600 years old or older. Hundreds of these stones can be found in northern Japan.

The labeled stones not only serve as a reminder of the lost human life, but also remind future generations to seek out higher terrain. The tsunami stones can be seen as a tsunami hazard or flood map embedded in the landscape, which serve as a memory tool for information that would otherwise be forgotten. Similar to high water marks on the beach, they record a dynamic story.

According to research, the tsunami stone tablets, which are reminiscent of the Meiji-Sanriku tsunami (1896), are of great importance in religious commemorations. Many of these memorials were erected before the sixth, twelfth, and thirty-second anniversaries of the disaster, which was slated to hold a Buddhist anniversary.

The tsunami stone tablets, which are reminiscent of the Shōwa-Sanriku tsunami (1933) , in contrast, were mostly erected immediately after the disaster - within three years. The Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun had called for donations and the proceeds were passed on to the three prefectures of Aomori , Iwate and Miyagi for the production of tsunami stone tablets with the requirement that the stone tablets be provided with inscriptions that the residents in the event of a tsunami Arrange for the area to flee quickly. The cause of this measure is considered to be that seismologists had already recognized the educational value of the tsunami stone tablets for disaster control at this point in time . It is also believed that the Great Kantō earthquake , which took place exactly 10 years before the Shōwa-Sanriku tsunami and devastated the capital Tokyo in 1923 , had heightened public awareness of the need for disaster risk reduction.

The folklorist Shuichi Kawashima (川島 秀 一), who studied the area of ​​the Pacific coast of the Tōhoku region for a long time , divided the monuments into two groups according to their function:

  • Tsunami stone tablets that "bring souls to rest". Most of the tsunami stone tablets of this type were created after the Meiji-Sanriku tsunami as a center for religious commemorations for the victims of the (past) tsunami disaster.
  • Tsunami stone tablets as "prayers for safety". Most of the tsunami stone tablets of this type were created after the Shōwa-Sanriku tsunami as a warning to the people in order to ensure safety in the event of (future) tsunamis.

The stone tablets for the rest of souls are supposed to serve people who were killed by past tsunamis, while the stone tablets of prayer for safety convey a message to future residents. However, the tsunami stone tablets for the dead also promote the passing on of knowledge about the continuing danger of the tsunami disasters, which have been repeated on site in the past, to future generations through the recursive commemoration services at these sites.

The two types of tsunami stone tablets reflect that their function has changed in the course of history in the Pacific coastal region of Tōhoku. The purpose or the expected effect of these stone tablets can be seen from the inscriptions. These inscriptions have changed from religious sutras to detailed accounts of the disaster, and finally to simple messages with instructions. This shift may be related to the spread of scientific knowledge about the dangers of natural forces such as earthquakes and tsunamis.

Tsunami stone tablet in Aneyoshi (in the Omoe area of Miyako (Iwate) ):
The four- foot- high monument of the great tsunami of 1933 in the village of Aneyoshi, which admonishes residents not to settle below its height. The engraved inscriptions include next to the name (above in the picture) of the stone memorial (大 津 浪 記念 碑) also the request (left in the picture): Do not build a house below this point! (此処 よ り 下 に 家 を 建 て る な)

The tsunami stone tablets, like other tsunami memorials, can be found in many areas along the Sanriku coast , some of which were destroyed by the Tōhoku tsunami (2011) such as in Minamisanriku . The village of Aneyoshi in Miyako , however, became known for the fact that the 2011 tsunami stopped shortly before the tsunami memorial. The government of Iwate Prefecture had ordered the erection of tsunami stone tablets at the heights of the floods caused by the 1933 Shōwa-Sanriku tsunami. Despite the targeted installation of the tsunami stone tablets, the population's knowledge of the existence of the stone tablets and the content of their message had gradually been forgotten over time, with a few exceptions such as the tsunami stone tablet in Aneyoshi. On the tsunami stone tablet in Aneyoshi there is an inscription owed to the state of seismology at the time, according to which there is a happy and safe life on higher ground. She asks to remember the devastating tsunami and never to build a house below the tsunami stone tablet. She reminds that both the Meiji-Sanriku-Tsunami and the Shōwa-Sanriku-Tsunami reached up to the height of the tsunami stone tablet and completely destroyed the village - in which there were only two survivors. After the stone tablet was erected after the Shōwa-Sanriku tsunami, the residents had never built a house below the height, after which there had been no deaths or injuries in the village during the Tōhoku tsunami in 2011.

The National General Association for Stone Shops (Zenyuseki) has begun erecting over 500 stone monuments that resemble the ancient stone tablets with inscriptions of disasters and educational messages for future generations.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Catherine Seavitt Nordenson, Guy Nordenson, Julia Chapman: Mapping Coastal Futures . In: Structures of Coastal Resilience . Island Press, Washington et al. 2018, Chapter 4, pp. 123–166 , doi : 10.1596 / 978-1-4648-0153-2 ( work accessible online on Google Books ).
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Isao Hayashi: Materializing Memories of Disasters: Individual Experiences in Conflict Concerning Disaster Remains in the Affected Regions of the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami . In: Bulletin of the National Museum of Ethnology [ 国立 民族 学 博物館 研究 報告 ] . tape 41 , no. 4 , March 30, 2017, p. 337-391 , doi : 10.15021 / 00008472 .
  3. ↑ a b Warning from the ancestors: Waystones in northern Japan warned of tsunamis. April 12, 2011, accessed May 15, 2011 .
  4. ↑ a b c d e Tsunami Warnings, Written in Stone ( Memento from May 20, 2018 on WebCite ) , nytimes.com, April 20, 2011, by Martin Fackler.
  5. ↑ a b c White Paper - Disaster Management in Japan 2015 (PDF, approx. 222 pages), http://www.bousai.go.jp/ (Cabinet Office, Japan / 内閣 府), Disaster Management in Japan, 2015 , here: page 68.
  6. ↑ a b Director General for Disaster management, Cabinet Office, Government of Japan: Index , http://www.bousai.go.jp/ (Cabinet Office Japan / 内閣 府), Disaster Management in Japan: 日本 の 災害 対 策 Disaster Management in Japan - Mar. 2015 (PDF, 49 pages), Cabinet Office Japan (内閣 府), March 2015, here: page 41, fig. "岩手 県 宮 古 市 姉 吉 地区 の 石碑 写真 提供 ： 宮 古 市 教育 委員会- Tsunami warning stone tablet in Aneyoshi, Miyako city, Miyagi Prefecture ", access via website:" White paper on Disaster Management ".
  7. ↑ a b c 平 成 27 年 版 防災 白 書 , Cabinet Office, Government of Japan (内閣 府), 防災 情報 の ペ ー ジ. Text: 平 成 27 年 版 防災 白 書 【本文 目次】 , here: 平 成 27 年 版 防災 白 書 ｜ 第 1 部 第 1 章 第 1 節 1－5 災害 教訓 の 伝 承 , 平 成 27 年 版 防災 白 書 ｜ 県 碑 津 津 津 ｜ 県 津 津 津宮 古 市 重 茂 姉 吉 地区） . Illustrations: 平 成 27 年 版 防災 白 書 【図 表 目次】 .
  8. ↑ Anawat Suppasri, Nobuo Shuto, Fumihiko Imamura, Shunichi Koshimura, Erick Mas, Ahmet Cevdet Yalciner: Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami: Performance of Tsunami Countermeasures, Coastal Buildings, and Tsunami Evacuation in Japan . In: Pure and Applied Geophysics . tape 170 , no. 6-8 , 2013, pp. 993-1018 , doi : 10.1007 / s00024-012-0511-7 . (Published online July 7, 2012).
  9. ^ Maki Norio: Long-Term Recovery from the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami Disaster . In: V. Santiago-Fandiño, YA Kontar, Y. Kaneda (Ed.): Post-Tsunami Hazard - Reconstruction and Restoration (=  Advances in Natural and Technological Hazards Research (NTHR, volume 44) ). Springer, 2015, ISBN 978-3-319-10201-6 , ISSN  1878-9897 , chap. 1 , p. 1-13 , doi : 10.1007 / 978-3-319-10202-3 . (Published online 23 September 2014).
  10. ↑ Masaru Arakida, Mikio Ishiwatari: Evacuation . In: Federica Ranghieri, Mikio Ishiwatari (Ed.): Learning from Megadisasters - Lessons from the Great East Japan Earthquake . World Bank Publications, Washington, DC 2014, ISBN 978-1-4648-0153-2 , Chapter 11, pp. 99-108 , doi : 10.1596 / 978-1-4648-0153-2 ( work accessible online on Google Books [accessed April 3, 2018]). , License: Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0 IGO.