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The Two Coasts
Topic Started: Jun 15 2017, 02:44 PM (547 Views)
Sam
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Artisan
Why is so much of Japan's population both at present and historically located on the Pacific coast? You would think given the earthquakes and tsunamis the Sea of Japan coast would be more attractive for settlement.

Also is there any place where I can access some basic historical data? What I am looking for is the following: given a year (say 1400) location of the major population centers, their population, and the main roads used at the time.

Finally (and I just thought of this right now) is there any work that looks at the impact of geography on the course of history? To what extent has Japanese geography impacted its history? There are some obvious observations (being an island makes it easier to be isolated or mountainous means the roads are fixed and controlling them is more important, etc.)
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kitsuno
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The Shogun

I have no idea about the first two questions, but for the third, There are two things I'd recommend you get your hands on. The first is David Spafford's PhD thesis, "War and Territorial Imagination in Late-Medieval Japan", and the other is an M.A. thesis by Elijah Bender called "The Last Man Standing: Causes of Daimyo Survival in Sixteenth Century Japan" (He looks at geographic factors in Daimyo survival among a variety of others). Both touch on this somewhat. For Spafford's, you'd have to go through a university to get a copy, but for the second one, it's available online here: https://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/handle/10125/20636
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Sam
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Thanks for the references! Also happy to know that the first question doesn't have an obvious answer (I was expecting a "everyone knows ..." type of answer).
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Bethetsu
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Tsushima no kami
If you want an obvious answer, look at a topological map. The big plain areas are on the Pacific side--Kanto Plain, Nagoya Plain, Sendai Plain, Osaka-Kyoto area. Though there are some plains on the Japan Sea side, they have extremely heavy snowfall and also are more isolated.

As for earthquakes and tsunamis, there have been major recent earthquakes in Kumamoto and Niigata, so they are not limited to the Pacific coast. Besides, has the threat of earthquakes or tsumamis ever kept people from living in an area?
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Sam
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Thanks, below is a map that illustrates your point, the big difference is the Kanto region:

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For earthquakes I used Japan Quake Map and if you play around with it you can see that the vast majority of earthquakes happen off the coast of Tohoku and Kanto regions in the Pacific. For example since Mar. 11, 2011 there have been 129 earthquakes of magnitude 6 or higher in Japan, and by my count only 33 occur outside the Kanto/Tohoku regions and their coastal areas. Only 4 out of 129 occur on the Sea of Japan coast.
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Toranosuke
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Tosa no kami
Some general survey texts attempt to address this geographical / topographical question. I don't have Sansom on me right now, but I think if I remember correctly, he spends quite a bit of time on this at the beginning of his 3-volume set "History of Japan."
上り口説 Nubui Kuduchi – Musings on the arts of Japan and beyond
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ltdomer98
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Daijo Daijin

The edited volume "Japan Emerging" has some essays on this at the beginning. Essentially, what Bethetsu said--the fertile plains (the Kanto, Kinai, and the Nobi being the biggest) are on the Pacific coast. Also, weather--the Sea of Japan coast gets BRUTAL winters with heavy snowfall, but the mountains across Honshu mostly protect the Pacific side.

It's really only modern agriculture that allows Hokkaido and places like Niigata (old Echigo) to be the bread/rice baskets that they are now.
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Sam
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Thank you Toranosuke & ltdomer98.

I remember Nate's strong recommendation of Japan Emerging in the book recommendation episodes. I looked at the first chapter of the book on Amazon and there Gina Barnes calls the Sea of Japan coast the "Snow Country" and sure enough it has even a Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_country_(Japan)
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ltdomer98
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Daijo Daijin

Sam
Jun 18 2017, 06:26 AM
Thank you Toranosuke & ltdomer98.

I remember Nate's strong recommendation of Japan Emerging in the book recommendation episodes. I looked at the first chapter of the book on Amazon and there Gina Barnes calls the Sea of Japan coast the "Snow Country" and sure enough it has even a Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_country_(Japan)


Since I'm Nate, I guess you can consider it a double recommendation ;)
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Sam
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Hi Nate! Thanks for the double recommendation. So far I really like the book for its simplicity, the first few chapters (the ones that I have looked at) are written in a very accessible language.
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Toranosuke
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I really love Japan Emerging. I like that it not only covers the history, but addresses some basic historiographical questions, like "what do we mean by 'medieval' and 'early modern' and why do we call the Kamakura-Muromachi and Edo periods those things?"

My only gripe with the book is that each chapter is too short. I was looking through it to consider assigning chapters to my students when I taught a Tokugawa Japan class last year, but none of the chapters seemed to ever describe out a topic quite extensively enough to be worth assigning... (then again, I don't have the book in front of me right now, so I might be mis-remembering, or mis-assessing)
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Sam
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Quote:
 
My only gripe with the book is that each chapter is too short. I was looking through it to consider assigning chapters to my students


Some might think of that as yet another benefit!
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ltdomer98
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Daijo Daijin

Toranosuke
Jun 18 2017, 12:01 PM
I really love Japan Emerging. I like that it not only covers the history, but addresses some basic historiographical questions, like "what do we mean by 'medieval' and 'early modern' and why do we call the Kamakura-Muromachi and Edo periods those things?"

My only gripe with the book is that each chapter is too short. I was looking through it to consider assigning chapters to my students when I taught a Tokugawa Japan class last year, but none of the chapters seemed to ever describe out a topic quite extensively enough to be worth assigning... (then again, I don't have the book in front of me right now, so I might be mis-remembering, or mis-assessing)


I put down Conlan's chapter on medieval warfare in my Global History of Warfare class syllabus I designed for last semester (it was a final project assignment, not actually a class I taught...yet). I'm reading through all the readings now as an informal reading group online with some friends, and I re-read the chapter, and yeah, it felt really short and not quite as detailed as what I wanted. Which might mean it's better for undergrads than I would like to think, or that it's better for a non-specialist undergrad course, but for majors something else would be in order.
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