Jiji Press TOKYO (Jiji Press) — Japanese and Taiwan museums signed an agreement Thursday to jointly conduct a project to replicate a voyage by people some 30,000 years ago from Taiwan to Okinawa.
The National Museum of Nature and Science and Taiwan’s National Museum of Prehistory aim to sail from Taiwan to Yonaguni Island in the summer of 2019.
The project is aimed at examining what kind of boats Japanese ancestors used when they crossed the sea to travel from Taiwan, which was contiguous to mainland China at that time.
In a test sail from Yonaguni Island to Okinawa’s Iriomote Island in July last year, the Japanese museum used Typha domingensis strong grass to make boats.
Under the new project, the two museums will make traditional bamboo rafts used by fishermen in Taiwan and conduct a test on the coast of Taitung, southeastern Taiwan, in June this year.
In the July 2016 test sail, two grass boats were hit by strong tides.
As the Kuroshio strong current flows between Taiwan and Yonaguni Island, the planned navigation is likely to be more difficult.
“We hope to see how bamboo rafts perform in the Kuroshio and at night,” said Yosuke Kaifu, division chief at the Japanese museum’s Department of Anthropology.Speech