was the name for ancient administrative units organized in

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 n ...

during the

Asuka period The was a period in the history of Japan lasting from 538 to 710 (or 592 to 645), although its beginning could be said to overlap with the preceding Kofun period. The Yamato polity evolved greatly during the Asuka period, which is named after ...

(AD 538–710), as part of a legal and governmental system borrowed from the Chinese. Though these units did not survive as administrative structures beyond the

Muromachi period The is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate (''Muromachi bakufu'' or ''Ashikaga bakufu''), which was officially established in 1338 by ...

(1336–1573), they did remain important geographical entities until the 19th century. Titsingh, Isaac. (1834). The Gokishichidō consisted of five provinces in the Kinai () or capital region, plus seven ''dō'' () or circuits, each of which contained provinces of its own. When

Hokkaido is Japan, Japan's Japanese archipelago, second largest island and comprises the largest and northernmost Prefectures of Japan, prefecture, making up its own List of regions of Japan, region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō from Honshu; th ...

was included as a circuit after the defeat of the Republic of Ezo in 1869, the system was briefly called . The abolition of the ''han'' system abolished the -han (early modern feudal domains) in 1871, -dō/circuits and provinces were per se not abolished by the abolition of domains; but the prefectures that sprang from the domains became the primary administrative division of the country and were soon merged and reorganized to territorially resemble provinces in many places. "Hokkai circuit" (Hokkai-dō) was the only -dō that would survive as administrative division, but it was later increasingly treated as "Hokkai prefecture" (Hokkai-dō); finally after WWII, the -dō was fully regarded as a prefecture: from 1946, the prefectures (until then only -fu/-ken) were legally referred to as -dō/-fu/-ken, from 1947 as -to/-dō/-fu/-ken.

Five Provinces

The five Kinai provinces were local areas in and around the imperial capital (first Heijō-kyō at

Nara The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an " independent federal agency of the United States government within the executive branch", charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It ...

, then Heian-kyō at Kyōto). They were: * Yamato Province (now

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, Wakaya ...

) *

Yamashiro Province was a province of Japan, located in Kinai. It overlaps the southern part of modern Kyoto Prefecture on Honshū. Aliases include , the rare , and . It is classified as an upper province in the '' Engishiki''. Yamashiro Province included Kyot ...

(now the southern part of Kyōto Prefecture, including the city of Kyōto) * Kawachi Province (now the southeastern part of

Osaka Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Osaka Prefecture has a population of 8,778,035 () and has a geographic area of . Osaka Prefecture borders Hyōgo Prefecture to the northwest, Kyoto Prefecture to the north, Nar ...

) *

Settsu Province was a province of Japan, which today comprises the southeastern part of Hyōgo Prefecture and the northern part of Osaka Prefecture. It was also referred to as or . Osaka and Osaka Castle were the main center of the province. Most of Set ...

(now the northern part of

, including the city of

Osaka 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 ...

, and parts of Hyōgo Prefecture) * Izumi Province (now the southern part of

)

Seven Circuits

The seven ''dō'' or circuits were administrative areas stretching away from the Kinai region in different directions. Running through each of the seven areas was an actual road of the same name, connecting the imperial capital with all of the provincial capitals along its route. The seven ''dō'' were: *Eastern sea circuit / Tōkaidō (running east along Japan's Pacific coast). *Eastern mountains circuit /

Tōsandō is a Japanese geographical term. It means both an ancient division of the country and the main road running through it. It is part of the ''Gokishichidō'' system. It was situated along the central mountains of northern Honshu, specifically th ...

(northeast through the Japanese Alps). *Northern land circuit / Hokurikudō (northeast along 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, i ...

coast). *Dark (Northern) mountains circuit / San'indō (west along the

coast).Titsingh, *Light (Southern) mountains circuit /

San'yōdō is a Japanese geographical term. It means both an ancient division of the country and the main road running through it. The San'yōdō corresponds for the most part with the modern conception of the San'yō region. This name derives from the id ...

(west along the northern side of the Seto Inland Sea). *Southern sea circuit / Nankaidō (south to the

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 ...

and the islands of Awaji and Shikoku). *Western sea circuit / Saikaidō (the "western" island,

Kyūshū is the third-largest island of Japan's five main islands and the most southerly of the four largest islands ( i.e. excluding Okinawa). In the past, it has been known as , and . The historical regional name referred to Kyushu and its surround ...

''Gokaidō''

The Gokishichidō roads should not be confused with the Edo Five Routes (五街道 ''Gokaidō''), which were the five major roads leading to

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 ...

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 character ...

(1603–1867). The Tōkaidō was one of the five routes, but the others were not.

Regional perimeters

Many prefectures were merged and reorganized in the 1870s and 1880s to resemble provinces, so many modern prefectures can be assigned to an ancient circuit. For example, the Western provinces of the Tōkai circuit ''(Tōkai-dō)'' are now part of prefectures that are often grouped together as the Tōkai region ''(Tōkai-chihō)''. But there are still deviations, so that it is not comprehensively possible to describe circuits in terms of prefectures. For example, present-day Hyōgo in its borders since 1876 extends into five provinces ( Harima, Tajima, Awaji, Settsu, Tamba)Hyōgo prefectural government
県域の変遷 (''ken'iki no hensen'', "changes of the prefectural territory")
with maps showing the evolution of Hyōgo's prefectural territory in the 1870s (Japanese), retrieved October 24, 2020. and thus into three circuits (San'yō, San'in, Nankai) as well as the ancient capital region. A few Japanese regions, such as Hokuriku and San'yō, still retain their ancient Gokishichidō names. Other parts of Japan, namely

Hokkaidō is Japan, Japan's Japanese archipelago, second largest island and comprises the largest and northernmost Prefectures of Japan, prefecture, making up its own List of regions of Japan, region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō from Honshu; th ...

and the

Ryukyu Islands The , also known as the or the , are a chain of Japanese islands that stretch southwest from Kyushu to Taiwan: the Ōsumi, Tokara, Amami, Okinawa, and Sakishima Islands (further divided into the Miyako and Yaeyama Islands), with Yon ...

, were not included in the Gokishichidō because they were not colonized by Japan until the 19th century, just as the Gokishichidō geographic divisions and the feudal '' han'' domains were being replaced with the modern system of prefectures. Initially the government tried to organize Hokkaidō as an eighth ''dō'' (hence the name), but it was soon consolidated into a single prefecture.

Notes

References

* Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric and Käthe Roth. (2005)
''Japan encyclopedia''.
Cambridge:

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the retir ...

.
OCLC 58053128
* Titsingh, Isaac. (1834)
''Annales des empereurs du Japon''
(''

Nihon Ōdai Ichiran , ', is a 17th-century chronicle of the serial reigns of Japanese emperors with brief notes about some of the noteworthy events or other happenings. According to the 1871 edition of the '' American Cyclopaedia'', the 1834 French translation of ...