Diffusion of Jomon Pottery Types as Information Flow

Abstract

Methodology in Japanese archaeology has been diversified recently. In this paper the author studies pattern types of Jomon pottery and their diffusion from the viewpoint of transmission, storage and change of the information on patterns. In the second section it is explained that pottery types transmit in a different way from other objects, as some other scholars have pointed out. Furthermore, the author explains that in the stream (i. e. transmission) of pottery types there is found, in addition to the transmission of structure and pattern elements, what may be called 'tendency'. It is explained that the transmission of types should be grasped as a unity, which includes 'tendency'. The thing thus grasped as a unity is what is considered to be 'information'. In the third section, it is explained that it is necessary for us to undetstand that the 'information' which is mentioned in this paper is that which circulated in the prehistoric age, and it has been stored in ruins and remains and flows from there toward us to be received. Then the author classifies the information in the prehistoric age, in respect to quality, into four stages. (1) First stage information-information on feeding, defense, aggression, etc., fundamental to living things. (2) Second stage information-information on hunting, trade, storage, etc., fundamental l to human society, and its programme. (3) Third stage information-information on religion, festivals, pottery patterns, art, politics, etc., of a higher order in human society, and its programme. (4) Fourth stage information-parallel to the third stage information, but on 'tendency'. The difference between the third and fourth stage information is that people living there can make an objective estimate of the third stage information, but it is difficult for them to make an objective estimate of the fourth stage information. In the next place, the author explains 'information processing' which includes storage and change as well as transmission, adopting the theory of Porf. Tamito YOHSIDA. Storage has three forms. The first one is storage in the human individual. The second is storage in ruins and remains ; thir is fixed storage. The third is a kind of transmission, and it is a form of information which flows within the group on the occasion of a festival or a rite. As for the change in information, there are cases where the same pattern comes to have a changed meaning. In the fourth section the author introduces some recent important articles on pottery types, and arranges the description as follows : (1) There is structure in pottery patterns. (2) Pattern elements can be reciprocated. (3) Some pottery patterns of different genealogy are compounded. (4) Some pottery of different genealogies coexists. In the fifth section the author charts the process of diffusion and transformation of pottery types, and gives the causes of the transfomation of patterns- (a) social pressures leading ro uniformity, (b) law of internal change of cognitive structure on types, (c) creative thinking, (d) intervention of fortuity, noise and fluctuation. The author applies social psychology to this study and assumes that social pressures did not necessarily have much influence on the innovation of pottery patters. The author explains that it is necessary to consider that the law of internal change of cognitive structure does not necessarily lead to symmetry, but it leads to balance of patterns on both right and left sides and of 'weight' of their meaning, even in the case of the law of pragnanz in gestalt theory. As for creative thinking, the author explains that no progress could be made without it, even if its function was not conspicuous.