is a

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

located on

Nakanoshima is a 3 km long and 50 hectares narrow sandbank in Kita-ku, Osaka city, Japan, that divides the Kyū-Yodo into the Tosabori and Dōjima rivers. Many governmental and commercial offices (including the city hall of Osaka), museums and other ...

, in Oki District,

Shimane Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūgoku region of Honshu. Shimane Prefecture is the second-least populous prefecture of Japan at 665,205 (February 1, 2021) and has a geographic area of 6,708.26 km2. Shimane Prefecture borders Yamaguc ...

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 ...

. As of March 2017, the town 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 2,293 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 68 persons per km². The total area was .

History

Ama was part of the ancient

Oki Province was a province of Japan consisted of the Oki Islands in the Sea of Japan, located off the coast of the provinces of Izumo and Hōki. The area is now Oki District in modern Shimane Prefecture. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''Awa no Kuni' ...

, and the island consisted of a single district, also called Ama, and three villages.

Emperor Go-Toba was the 82nd emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. His reign spanned the years from 1183 through 1198. This 12th-century sovereign was named after Emperor Toba, and ''go-'' (後), translates literally as "later"; an ...

, defeated in the

Jōkyū War , also known as the Jōkyū Disturbance or the Jōkyū Rebellion, was fought in Japan between the forces of Retired Emperor Go-Toba and those of the Hōjō clan, regents of the Kamakura shogunate, whom the retired emperor was trying to overthr ...

in 1221, was exiled to the Oki Islands, and lived in Ama for 19 years until his death in 1239. Oki Shrine was built in 1939 to commemorate the 700th year of his death.

Geography

Ama occupies all of the island of Nakanoshima, in the

Oki Islands The is an archipelago in the Sea of Japan, the islands of which are administratively part of Oki District, Shimane Prefecture, Japan. The islands have a total area of . Only four of the around 180 islands are permanently inhabited. Much of the ...

archipelago in the

Sea of Japan The Sea of Japan is the marginal sea between the Japanese archipelago, Sakhalin, the Korean Peninsula, and the mainland of the Russian Far East. The Japanese archipelago separates the sea from the Pacific Ocean. Like the Mediterranean Sea, it h ...

, along with a number of offshore uninhabited islands and rocks. Much of the island is within the borders of

Daisen-Oki National Park is a national park in the Chūgoku region, Honshū, Japan, and spans the prefectures of Okayama, Shimane, and Tottori. Mount Daisen is the focus of the park, which also includes the volcanic mountains and plains of Hiruzen, Mount Kenashi, Mo ...

Climate

Ama has a

humid subtropical climate A humid subtropical climate is a zone of climate characterized by hot and humid summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents (except Antarctica), generally between latitudes 25° and 40° ...

(

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'') with very warm summers and cool winters. Precipitation is abundant throughout the year. The average annual temperature in Ama is . The average annual rainfall is with July as the wettest month. The temperatures are highest on average in August, at around , and lowest in February, at around . The highest temperature ever recorded in Ama was on 5 August 2010; the coldest temperature ever recorded was on 27 February 1981.

Demographics

Ama came under the control of the

Matsue Domain was a Japanese domain of the Edo period. It was associated with Izumo Province in modern-day Shimane Prefecture.

in 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 ...

, and was divided into seven villages. After the

Meiji restoration The , referred to at the time as the , and also known as the Meiji Renovation, Revolution, Regeneration, Reform, or Renewal, was a political event that restored practical imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Although there were ...

, the Oki Islands became part of

Tottori Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūgoku region of Honshu. Tottori Prefecture is the least populous prefecture of Japan at 570,569 (2016) and has a geographic area of . Tottori Prefecture borders Shimane Prefecture to the west, Hirosh ...

in 1871, but were transferred to

in 1881. Ama Village was established in 1904. Its population peaked in 1950 with 6,986 inhabitants, and has declined ever since. It was raised to town status on January 1, 1969.

Economy

The town economy is primarily based on agriculture and

commercial fishing Commercial fishing is the activity of catching fish and other seafood for commercial profit, mostly from wild fisheries. It provides a large quantity of food to many countries around the world, but those who practice it as an industry must often ...

Notable people from Ama

Misako Tanaka , née , is a Japanese actress from Oki District, Shimane Prefecture, Japan. In 1995, she married comedian Kuniyuki Fukasawa. Filmography Film * ダイアモンドは傷つかない (''Daiamondo wa kizutsukanai'') (1982) * 丑三つの村 ...

– actress

References

External links

* * {{Authority control Towns in Shimane Prefecture Populated coastal places in Japan