Aji granite

The production area for Aji stone centers on Aji-cho and Mure-cho in Takamatsu, Kagawa. Aji-cho is presented as a peninsula town at the northern edge of Shikoku, facing the Seto Inland Sea, while local stoneworking groups link the industry to both Aji and Mure. The regional collective trademark sets a practical boundary around the name: stone from these towns, and processed items such as gravestones and lanterns made there from that stone.

Aji stone is described as a fine-grained granite or granodiorite with small crystals of quartz, feldspar, mica, and black mica. Its dense grain is associated with hardness, low water absorption, and resistance to weathering and discoloration. For stoneworkers, those traits are not decorative language; they define how thin a detail can be carved, how a surface can be polished, and how the stone behaves when cut.

Some Aji stone shows a surface effect called “fu ga uku” after polishing. The descriptions compare it to a mottled, moistened-looking pattern and to a double kasuri-like surface across the stone. On gravestones, monuments, or building material, that effect gives the polished face a fine movement of light and dark rather than a flat gray plane.

The work begins at the quarry. Rock plates are taken by blasting, large pieces are removed through large splitting, and smaller splitting brings the stone closer to the size needed for later work. Each stage depends on reading the grain, because a hard stone must be opened and shaped with attention to its natural direction before it can be sawed or carved cleanly.

In the workshop, stone is cut by saw according to drawings, then shaped in detail with chisels. The fine, hard grain of Aji stone supports this close work, while the stoneworker keeps checking the material by sight and touch. A finished edge, polished plane, or carved line is judged through the hand as well as the eye.

Aji stone appears in gravestones, stone monuments, lanterns, stone carving, memorial works, exterior art, and architectural materials. These uses differ in scale, but each asks the stoneworker to balance hardness, grain direction, cut surface, and polish. A lantern, a gravestone face, and a building stone all carry the same material discipline into different settings.

Accounts of Aji stone trace quarrying and processing back to the late Heian period, with stone said to have been shipped as far as Kyoto. The present production area is also described through cooperatives, member workshops, stonework examples, workshop routes, fairs, and craft events. Continuity here rests in named towns and repeatable tasks: quarrying, splitting, cutting, polishing, carving, and handing stonework from one workshop stage to another.