is a

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...

located in

Mie Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Mie Prefecture has a population of 1,781,948 () and has a geographic area of . Mie Prefecture is bordered by Gifu Prefecture to the north, Shiga Prefecture and Kyoto Prefectur ...

, Japan. , the city 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 157,235 in 66,018 households and a

population density Population density (in agriculture: Stock (disambiguation), 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 ...

of 250 persons per km². The total area of the city is . The city is famous for

Matsusaka beef is the meat of Japanese Black cattle reared under strict conditions in the Matsusaka region of Mie in Japan. It has a high fat-to-meat ratio. Within Japan, it is one of the three ''Sandai Wagyū'', the "three big beefs"; the others are Kobe ...

Geography

Matsusaka is located in east-central

Kii Peninsula The is the largest peninsula on the island of Honshū in Japan. It is named after the ancient Kii Province. Overview The area south of the “ Central Tectonic Line” is called , and is home to reef-like coral communities which are among ...

, in central Mie Prefecture. It stretches the width of Mie Prefecture, and is bordered by

Ise Bay is a bay located at the mouth of the Kiso Three Rivers between Mie and Aichi Prefectures in Japan. Ise Bay has an average depth of and a maximum depth of . The mouth of the bay is and is connected to the smaller Mikawa Bay by two channels: ...

on the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contin ...

to the east, and

Nara Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Nara Prefecture has a population of 1,321,805 and has a geographic area of . Nara Prefecture borders Kyoto Prefecture to the north, Osaka Prefecture to the northwest, Wakayam ...

to the west. Parts of the city are within the limits of the

Yoshino-Kumano National Park is a national park comprising several non-contiguous areas of Mie, Nara, and Wakayama Prefectures, Japan. Established in 1936, the park includes Mount Yoshino, celebrated for its cherry blossoms, as well as elements of the UNESCO World Heritag ...

Neighboring municipalities

Mie Prefecture * Tsu * Taki *

Meiwa was a after '' Hōreki'' and before '' An'ei.'' This period spanned the years from June 1764 through November 1772. The reigning empress and emperor were and . Change of era * 1764 : The era name became ''Meiwa'' (meaning "Bright Harmony") b ...

* Ōdai Nara Prefecture * Higashiyoshino * Kawakami * Mitsue

Climate

Matsusaka has a Humid subtropical climate (Köppen ''Cfa'') characterized by warm summers and cool winters with light to no snowfall. The average annual temperature in Matsusaka is . The average annual rainfall is with September as the wettest month. The temperatures are highest on average in August, at around , and lowest in January, at around .

Demographics

Per Japanese census data,Matsusaka population statistics
/ref> the population of Matsusaka has been increasing slowly over the past 50 years.

History

Matsusaka developed as a commercial center during the

Sengoku period The was a period in History of Japan, Japanese history of near-constant civil war and social upheaval from 1467 to 1615. The Sengoku period was initiated by the Ōnin War in 1467 which collapsed the Feudalism, feudal system of Japan under the ...

, and

Oda Nobukatsu was a Japanese samurai of the Azuchi–Momoyama period. He was the second son of Oda Nobunaga. He survived the decline of the Oda clan from political prominence, becoming a ''daimyō'' in the early Edo period. Though often described as an inco ...

, the younger son of Oda Nobunaga built a castle in the area in 1580. The area came under the control of

Gamō Ujisato or Gamō Yasuhide was a Japanese ''daimyō'' of the Sengoku and Azuchi–Momoyama periods. He was heir and son of Gamō Katahide, lord of Hino Castle in Ōmi Province, he later held Matsusaka ( Ise Province) and finally Aizuwakamatsu Castle i ...

shortly thereafter, and the Gamō began construction of a castle in the and named the site "Matsusaka," meaning "slope (坂) covered with pines (松)" in 1588. Matsusaka Castle was the center of the short-lived Matsusaka Domain in the early

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Tokugawa-jidai''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia ...

, but for most of 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 characte ...

, the castle was the eastern outpost of

Kishu Domain The , sometimes called ''Kishu Inu'' or ''Kishu dog'', is a Japanese breed of dog. It is descended from ancient medium-sized breeds and named after the Kishu region, now Mie Prefecture and Wakayama Prefecture. It was designated a living nati ...

based at

Wakayama Castle 260px, Layout of the ''tenshu'' is a Japanese castle located in the city Wakayama, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan. For most of the Edo Period, it was the administrative center of Kishū Domain, which was controlled by a cadet branch of the Tokugaw ...

. Following 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 area became part of Mie Prefecture. The town of Matsusaka was created on April 1, 1889 with the establishment of the modern municipalities system. The second ''

kanji are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese ...

'' character of Matsusaka was changed to 阪 from 坂 in those days. On March 26, 1893, 1318 houses in the town were destroyed in a fire. Matsusaka was raised to city status on February 1, 1933. The city suffered only light damage in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, when an air raid killed four people on February 4, 1945. About 700 houses in the city were destroyed by a fire on December 16, 1951. On October 15, 1956, a major railway accident occurred at Rokken Station on the outskirts of the city, killing 42 people. On August 1, 1982, Typhoon Bess left nine people dead in its wake. The city officially celebrated its 500th anniversary in 1988. On January 1, 2005, the city expanded to its present borders, with the absorption the towns of Mikumo and Ureshino (both from

Ichishi District was a district located in Mie Prefecture, Japan. As of 2003, the district had an estimated population of 70,117 and a density of 150.14 persons per km2. The total area was 467.00 km2. Until the day before the dissolution on December 31, 20 ...

), and the towns of Iinan and Iitaka (both from Iinan District).

Government

Matsusaka has a mayor-council form of government with a directly elected mayor and a

unicameral Unicameralism (from ''uni''- "one" + Latin ''camera'' "chamber") is a type of legislature, which consists of one house or assembly, that legislates and votes as one. Unicameral legislatures exist when there is no widely perceived need for multi ...

city council of 28 members. Matsusaka contributes four members to the Mie Prefectural Assembly. In terms of national politics, the city is part of Mie 1st district of the lower house of the Diet of Japan.

Education

Matsusaka has 36 public elementary schools and 12 public middle schools operated by the city government and four public high schools operated by the Mie Prefectural Board of Education. There are also one private middle school and two private high schools. The prefectural also operates two special education schools for the handicapped. Mie Chukyo University, formerly located in Matsusaka, closed in 2013.

Transportation

Railway

JR Tōkai –

Kisei Main Line The is a railway line that parallels the coastline of the Kii Peninsula in Japan between Mie Prefecture and Wakayama Prefecture. The name takes the ''kanji'' characters from the names of the old provinces of and . The line is operated by Ce ...

* - -

JR Tōkai –

Meishō Line The is a rural, regional railway line of Central Japan Railway Company (JR Central) in Mie Prefecture, Japan, connecting Matsusaka station in Matsusaka and Ise-Okitsu station in Tsu. The line takes its name from the kanji characters of the c ...

* - - 20px

Kintetsu Railway , referred to as , is a Japanese passenger railway company, managing infrastructure and operating passenger train service. Its railway system is the largest in Japan, excluding Japan Railways Group. The railway network connects Osaka, Nara, Ky ...

Osaka Line is a designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the third most populous city in Japan, following Special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama. With a population of 2.7 ...

* 20px

- Nagoya Line * 20px

- Yamada Line * - - - - - -

Highway

* 24px, link=, alt=E23 Ise Expressway * * * * *

Seaports

* Port of Matsusaka

Sister city relations

* -

Binhu District Binhu District () is one of six urban districts of Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, People's Republic of China. Located in the delta hinterland of the Yangtze River The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest list of rivers of Asia, river i ...

Wuxi Wuxi (, ) is a city in southern Jiangsu province, eastern China, by car to the northwest of downtown Shanghai, between Changzhou and Suzhou. In 2017 it had a population of 3,542,319, with 6,553,000 living in the entire prefecture-level city ar ...

, Jiangsu Province, China

Local attractions

* Matsusaka Castle ruins * Takarazuka kofun ancient burial mound * Azaka Castle ruins

Notable people

Mitsui Takatoshi was the founder of the Mitsui family of merchants and industrialists that later emerged as the Mitsui Group, a powerful Japanese zaibatsu (business conglomerate). Life Mitsui was born in 1622, in Matsusaka, Ise Province (present-day Matsusa ...

, founder of the

Mitsui is one of the largest ''keiretsu'' in Japan and one of the largest corporate groups in the world. The major companies of the group include Mitsui & Co. ( general trading company), Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, Nippon Paper Industries ...

group. *

Motoori Norinaga was a Japanese scholar of ''Kokugaku'' active during the Edo period. He is conventionally ranked as one of the Four Great Men of Kokugaku (nativist) studies. Life Norinaga was born in what is now Matsusaka in Ise Province (now part of Mie ...

,Edo period

kokugaku ''Kokugaku'' ( ja, 國學, label= Kyūjitai, ja, 国学, label=Shinjitai; literally "national study") was an academic movement, a school of Japanese philology and philosophy originating during the Tokugawa period. Kokugaku scholars worked to r ...

scholar *

Matsuura Takeshirō was a Japanese explorer, cartographer, writer, painter, priest, and antiquarian. During the late Edo period and Bakumatsu he journeyed six times to Ezo, including to Sakhalin and the Kuriles. In the early Meiji period he was an official in the ...

explorer Exploration refers to the historical practice of discovering remote lands. It is studied by geographers and historians. Two major eras of exploration occurred in human history: one of convergence, and one of divergence. The first, covering most ...

, cartographer,

writer A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, p ...

, painter,

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in partic ...

, and antiquarian * Tetsuo Morimoto, politician *

Masaharu Nakagawa Masaharu Nakagawa may refer to: *Masaharu Nakagawa (House of Representatives) is a Japanese politician serving in the House of Representatives in the Diet (national legislature) as a member of the Democratic Party of Japan. A native of Matsusaka ...

, politician *

Kana Nishino is a Japanese singer and songwriter signed with SME Records' Newcome Inc. She debuted on February 20, 2008, with the single "I". Often considered one of Japan's most popular female singers of the late 2000s and 2010s, she gained early populari ...

,J-pop/R&B singer * Norihisa Tamura, politician * Ben Wada, film director * Ikuzo Saito, Olympic wrestler *

Satoshi Hida is a former Japanese football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where ...

, professional soccer player * Keisuke Funatani, professional soccer player *

Mienoumi Tsuyoshi is a Japanese former professional sumo wrestler from Matsusaka, Mie. He was the 57th '' yokozuna'' of the sport. After retiring he founded the Musashigawa stable and was a chairman of the Japan Sumo Association. He was the first rikishi in hi ...

, sumo wrestler *

Hiroki Mizumoto is a Japanese people, Japanese Association football, football player who plays for SC Sagamihara. Club career Mizumoto was born in Ise, Mie, Ise. After graduating from Mie High School, he joined J1 League side JEF United Chiba, JEF United Ichi ...

, professional soccer player * Yotsukasa Dai, sumo wrestler *

Aki Deguchi also known as ''Aki'', is a Japanese singer, as a solo artist and former member of the Japanese idol J-pop group SKE48. Career Deguchi participated in AKB48's First AKK Kenky Audience (Force 4), which included 18 people who were accepted as tr ...

, J-pop idol and singer

References

External links

*
Matsusaka city guide
from th
Mie Guidebook
a
Mie JETs
{{Authority control Cities in Mie Prefecture Populated coastal places in Japan Port settlements in Japan Populated places established in 1588