is a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

located in

Nagano Prefecture is a landlocked prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshū. Nagano Prefecture has a population of 2,052,493 () and has a geographic area of . Nagano Prefecture borders Niigata Prefecture to the north, Gunma Prefecture to the ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. , the village had an estimated

population Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using a ...

of 3,693 in 1558 households, and a

population density Population density (in agriculture: standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical term.Matt RosenberPopul ...

of 16 persons per km². The total area of the village is .

Geography

Ōkuwa is located in the

Kiso Mountains are a mountain range in Nagano and Gifu prefectures in Japan. They are also called the and they combine with the Hida Mountains ("Northern Alps") and the Akaishi Mountains ("Southern Alps") to form a group collectively known as the Japanese Al ...

of southwest Nagano Prefecture, bordered by the Atera Mountains to the west. The

Kiso River The is a river in the Chubu region of Japan roughly long, flowing through the prefectures of Nagano, Gifu, Aichi, and Mie before emptying into Ise Bay a short distance away from the city of Nagoya.Nussbaum, Louis Frédéric ''et al.'' (2005) ...

flows through the village.

Mount Utsugi is a mountain located on the boundary of Okuwa, Iijima and Miyada, Nagano Prefecture, in the Chūbu region of Japan. It is tall and part of the Kiso Mountains are a mountain range in Nagano and Gifu prefectures in Japan. They are als ...

(2864 meters) and

Mount Minamikoma is a mountain located on the border between Okuwa, Nagano, Okuwa, Kiso District, Nagano, Kiso District, and Iijima, Nagano, Iijima, Kamiina District, Nagano, Kamiina District, Nagano Prefecture, in the Chūbu region of Japan. It is tall and part ...

(2841 meters) are on the border of the village.

Surrounding municipalities

*Nagano Prefecture ** Iida ** Komagane ** Iijima ** Agematsu **

Nagiso is a town located in Nagano Prefecture, Japan. , the town had an estimated population of 4,111 in 1751 households, and a population density of 19 persons per km². The total area of the town was . Nagiso is listed as one of The Most Beautiful ...

** Ōtaki *

Gifu Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshu. Gifu Prefecture has a population of 1,991,390 () and has a geographic area of . Gifu Prefecture borders Toyama Prefecture to the north; Ishikawa Prefecture to the northwest, F ...

Nakatsugawa Magome-juku on the Nakasendō is a city located in Gifu, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 78,930, and a population density of 120 persons per km2 in 30,788 households The total area of the city was . Geography Nakatsugawa is in ...

Demographics

Per Japanese census data, the population of Ōkuwa has decreased over the past 50 years.

Climate

The town has a climate characterized by characterized by hot and humid summers, and cold winters (

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

''Cfa''). The average annual temperature in Ōkuwa is 12.6 °C. The average annual rainfall is 1680 mm with September as the wettest month. The temperatures are highest on average in August, at around 25.1 °C, and lowest in January, at around 0.4 °C.Ōkuwa climate data
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History

The area of present-day Ōkuwa was part of ancient

Shinano Province or is an old province of Japan that is now Nagano Prefecture. Shinano bordered on Echigo, Etchū, Hida, Kai, Kōzuke, Mikawa, Mino, Musashi, Suruga, and Tōtōmi Provinces. The ancient capital was located near modern-day Matsumoto, whi ...

. The area developed as

Suhara-juku was the thirty-ninth of the sixty-nine stations of the Nakasendō, as well as the seventh of eleven stations on the Kisoji. It is located in the present-day village of Ōkuwa, in the Kiso District of Nagano Prefecture, Japan Japan ( ja, ...

and Nojiri-shuku two post stations on the

Nakasendō The , also called the ,Richard Lane, ''Images from the Floating World'' (1978) Chartwell, Secaucus ; pg. 285 was one of the five routes of the Edo period, and one of the two that connected Edo (modern-day Tokyo) to Kyoto in Japan. There were 6 ...

highway connecting

Edo Edo ( ja, , , "bay-entrance" or "estuary"), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo. Edo, formerly a ''jōkamachi'' (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the ''de facto'' capital of ...

with

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

during the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

. The present village of Ōkuwa was established on April 1, 1889 by the establishment of the modern municipalities system.

Education

Ōkuwa has one public elementary school and one public middle school operated by the town government. The village does not have a high school.

Transportation

Railway

R Tōkai - Chūō Main Line ** - -

Highway

International relations

* – Shelbyville, Illinois, USA, sister city

References

External links

*
Official Website
Villages in Nagano Prefecture {{Nagano-geo-stub