Fujinoki Kofun, Burial mound in Ikaruga, Japan

Fujinoki Kofun is a circular burial mound in Ikaruga measuring roughly 40 meters across and rising nearly 8 meters high. The stone burial chambers inside are accessed through a lateral entrance that leads into the hillside.

Built in the fourth quarter of the 6th century, this circular mound was long known as Misasaki or Ryōzan and was tended by the nuns of Hōshakuji until a fire in 1854. Excavations from 1985 to 2006 revealed an unlooted lateral stone chamber with a single house-shaped tuff coffin holding two adults. The site was designated a national historic site in 1991.

The name Fujinoki comes from the local place name; old Horyu-ji records call the mound Misasaki or Misasagiyama, and a small hall of the Hoshaku-ji nunnery stood beside it until an 1854 fire. A lamp dish of the Edo period found among Kofun-period pottery in the chamber shows that memorial rites continued there into early modern times.

The site lies roughly 350 meters west of Horyu-ji Temple and can be reached by a short walk. At the nearby Archaeological Research Institute, visitors can view replicas of the finds and a three-dimensional model of the structure.

The discovered gilded bronze fittings for horses show close craft connections to the Korean peninsula during the late Kofun period. Some decorative objects bear traces of a special manufacturing technique that was still rare in Japan at that time.