 Chūgoku region (中国地方, Chūgoku-chihō) or
San'in-San'yō region (山陰山陽地方, San'in san'yō-chihō)
- The westernmost region of Honshū, the largest island of
Japan. It consists of the prefectures of Hiroshima,
Yamaguchi, Shimane, Tottori, and Okayama.
The name literally means "middle country", a relic of a
historical division of Japan into "near countries" (近国
kingoku, but in modern parlance Kinki), "middle countries" (chūgoku),
and "far countries" (遠国 ongoku), based on distance from the
capital Nara or Kyoto. Strictly speaking, today's Chūgoku
covers only the middle countries to the west of Kyoto, along
the San'indō (山陰道) and San'yōdō (山陽道) roads.
In Japanese, the characters 中国 and the reading Chūgoku are
also used to mean "China" (more precisely, the People's
Republic of China since the Republic of China is commonly
referred to as "Taiwan" in Japanese). The same characters
are used in Chinese to refer to China, but pronounced
Zhōngguó lit. "Middle Kingdom" or "Middle Country" (Wade
Giles: Chungkuo).
To avoid confusing "Chūgoku region" with China, the Chūgoku
region is also called the "San'in-San'yō region". San'in is
the northern part facing the Sea of Japan, which indicates
the "shady side of the mountain". San'yō is the southern
part facing the Inland Sea, which indicates the "sunny side
of the mountain". These names originated from the marked
differences in climate.
The Chūgoku region consists of the following prefectures:
Hiroshima, Yamaguchi, Shimane and Tottori. Okayama is
commonly included, although only Bitchū Province was
considered a Middle Country, Mimasaka Province and Bizen
Province, the other two components of modern-day Okayama,
were considered Near Countries.
The Chūgoku region is characterized by irregular rolling
hills and limited plain areas and is divided into two
distinct parts by mountains running east and west through
its center.
The city of Hiroshima, the "capital" of the Chūgoku region,
was rebuilt after being destroyed by an atomic bomb in 1945,
and is now an industrial metropolis of more than one million
people.
Overfishing and pollution reduced the productivity of the
Inland Sea fishing grounds, and the area concentrated on
heavy industry. San'in, however, is less industrialized and
relies on agriculture.
Kyūshū and Kansai neighbor the Chūgoku region.
Information source: “Chūgoku region.” wikipedia.org. Article
date: 6 Feb. 2008. Retrieved: Wikipedia. 4 Mar. 2008 <Chūgoku region>. |
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