ABSTRACT
The first phase of the Kofun period (EK-1) is postulated to have lasted approximately half a century (AD 250-300). These decades saw major political shifts on the China Mainland: the Three Kingdoms of Wei (221-265), Wu (221-280) and Shu Han (221-263) were eventually consolidated into the Western Jin Dynasty (265-316) which ostensibly united China, however tenuously. Subsequent to Himiko’s embassies to Wei in the mid-3rd century, there is one recorded embassy of her successor, a 13-year-old girl named Iyo, in AD 266 to the court of Western Jin upon its establishment (Tsunoda and Goodrich 1951: 16). Depending on the destination, the embassy could have reached the still functioning Wu Court or the Western Jin Court. It is fairly clear that Chinese goods continued to flow into the western archipelago for a short while into the Kofun period, the most controversial of these being the TR-mirrors allegedly made in China. The addition of Chinese lamellar armour to the list of imports suggests that the Wei or Western Jin Courts had an interest in arming chieftains in the archipelago as allies against the Xiongnu and Xianbei ‘barbarians’ who were still threatening the northern borders.
