is an

island An island or isle is a piece of land, distinct from a continent, completely surrounded by water. There are continental islands, which were formed by being split from a continent by plate tectonics, and oceanic islands, which have never been ...

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 ...

. The island is located approximately west of the city of Murakami in northern

Niigata Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture in the Chūbu region of Honshu of Japan. Niigata Prefecture has a population of 2,131,009 (1 July 2023) and is the List of Japanese prefectures by area, fifth-largest prefecture of Japan by geographic area ...

. Awashima is administratively the village of

Awashimaura is a village located in Niigata Prefecture, Japan. , the village had an estimated population of 353, and a population density of 36.1 persons per km. The total area of the village is . Geography The village is located on Awashima Island, locat ...

under Iwafune District of Niigata Prefecture. , the island's population is 353.Awashimaura population statistics
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History

Awashima has been inhabited since at least the

Jōmon period In Japanese history, the is the time between , during which Japan was inhabited by the Jōmon people, a diverse hunter-gatherer and early agriculturalist population united by a common culture, which reached a considerable degree of sedentism an ...

, as archaeologists have found Jōmon period pottery shards in five locations on the islands east coast. However, no evidence of inhabitation from the

Yayoi period The Yayoi period (弥生時代, ''Yayoi jidai'') (c. 300 BC – 300 AD) is one of the major historical periods of the Japanese archipelago. It is generally defined as the era between the beginning of food production in Japan and the emergence o ...

or the

Kofun period The is an era in the history of Japan from about 300 to 538 AD (the date of the introduction of Buddhism), following the Yayoi period. The Kofun and the subsequent Asuka periods are sometimes collectively called the Yamato period. This period is ...

has yet been discovered. The name of the island first appears in a verse in the

Nara period The of the history of Japan covers the years from 710 to 794. Empress Genmei established the capital of Heijō-kyō (present-day Nara). Except for a five-year period (740–745), when the capital was briefly moved again, it remained the capita ...

Man'yōshū The is the oldest extant collection of Japanese (poetry in Classical Japanese), compiled sometime after AD 759 during the Nara period. The anthology is one of the most revered of Japan's poetic compilations. The compiler, or the last in ...

'' poetry anthology, at which time the island was on the frontier of the

Yamato state The was a tribal alliance centered on the Yamato region (Nara Prefecture) from the 4th century to the 7th century, and ruled over the alliance of noble families in the central and western parts of the Japanese archipelago. The age is from th ...

with the

Emishi The were a group of people who lived in parts of northern Honshū in present-day Japan, especially in the Tōhoku region. The first mention of the Emishi in literature that can be corroborated with outside sources dates to the 5th century AD, ...

. The

Matsura clan The Matsura clan, also spelled Matsuura, was a medieval and early modern Japanese samurai family who ruled Hirado Domain in Hizen Province on the island of Kyushu. They started as a group of military families under the name Matsura-to. They were ...

of northern

Kyushu is the third-largest island of Japan's Japanese archipelago, four main islands and the most southerly of the four largest islands (i.e. excluding Okinawa Island, Okinawa and the other Ryukyu Islands, Ryukyu (''Nansei'') Ryukyu Islands, Islands ...

, noted pirates and sea traders, began to occupy the eastern shore of the island from the 9th century, gradually pushing the Emishi out. During the

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

, the island passed between

Murakami Domain was a feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in Echigo Province (modern-day Niigata Prefecture), Japan. It was centered on Murakami Castle in what is now the city of Murakami, Niigata.Shonai Domain and direct control by the

Tokugawa Shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. The Tokugawa shogunate was established by Tokugawa Ieyasu after victory at the Battle of Sekigahara, ending the civil wars ...

several times. During the

Boshin War The , sometimes known as the Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War, was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a coalition seeking to seize political power in the name of the Impe ...

, the Schnell brothers offloaded weapons for Shonai Domain at Awashima. 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 Imperial House of Japan, imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Althoug ...

, the village of Asahimaura was created in 1909 as part of Iwafune, District, Niigata Prefecture. The epicentre of the

1964 Niigata earthquake The 1964 Niigata earthquake () struck at 13:01 local time (04:01 UTC) on 16 June with a magnitude of either 7.5 or 7.6. The epicenter was on the continental shelf off the northwest coast of Honshu, Japan, in Niigata Prefecture, about north of ...

was near Awashima.

Climate

Important Bird Area

The island has been recognised as an

Important Bird Area An Important Bird and Biodiversity Area (IBA) is an area identified using an internationally agreed set of criteria as being globally important for the conservation of bird populations. IBA was developed and sites are identified by BirdLife Int ...

(IBA) by

BirdLife International BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations that strives to conserve birds and their habitats. BirdLife International's priorities include preventing extinction of bird species, identifying and safeguarding i ...

because it supports a large breeding colony of

streaked shearwater The streaked shearwater (''Calonectris leucomelas'') is a species of seabird. The adult bird averages in length, with a wingspan. Description The streaked shearwater feeds mainly on fish and squid. It follows fishing boats, attracted to anch ...

Minor Planet

A minor planet

13039 Awashima Thirteen or 13 may refer to: * 13 (number) * Any of the years 13 BC, AD 13, 1913, or 2013 Music Albums * 13 (Black Sabbath album), ''13'' (Black Sabbath album), 2013 * 13 (Blur album), ''13'' (Blur album), 1999 * 13 (Borgeous album), ''13'' (Bo ...

has been named after the island.

Notes

References

* ''Teikoku's Complete Atlas of Japan'', Teikoku-Shoin., Ltd. Tokyo 1990,

External links

Awashimaura Village Official Website
{{Authority control Islands of the Sea of Japan Islands of Niigata Prefecture Important Bird Areas of Japan Seabird colonies