The is a collective term for the groups of islands that are located to the south of the

Japanese archipelago The is an archipelago of list of islands of Japan, 14,125 islands that form the country of Japan. It extends over from the Sea of Okhotsk in the northeast to the East China Sea, East China and Philippine Sea, Philippine seas in the southwest al ...

. They extend from the

Izu Peninsula The is a mountainous peninsula with a deeply indented coastline to the west of Tokyo on the Pacific Ocean, Pacific coast of the island of Honshu, Japan, the largest of the four main islands of Japan. Formerly known as Izu Province, Izu peninsu ...

west of

Tokyo Bay is a bay located in the southern Kantō region of Japan spanning the coasts of Tokyo, Kanagawa Prefecture, and Chiba Prefecture, on the southern coast of the island of Honshu. Tokyo Bay is connected to the Pacific Ocean by the Uraga Channel. Th ...

southward for about , to within of the

Mariana Islands The Mariana Islands ( ; ), also simply the Marianas, are a crescent-shaped archipelago comprising the summits of fifteen longitudinally oriented, mostly dormant volcanic mountains in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, between the 12th and 21st pa ...

. The Nanpō Islands are all administered by Tokyo Metropolis. The Hydrographic and Oceanographic Department of the

Japan Coast Guard The is the coast guard responsible for the protection of the Geography of Japan#Composition, topography and geography, coastline of Japan under the oversight of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. It consists of about ...

defines the Nanpō Shotō as follows:Ajiro Tatsuhiko and Warita Ikuo, ''Waga kuni no kōiki na chimei oyobi sono han'i ni tsuite no chōsa kenkyū'' (The geographical names and those extents of the wide areas in Japan), Kaiyō Jōhōbu Gihō, Vol. 27, 200
online edition
/ref> * Nanpō Shotō (Nanpō Islands) ** Izu Shotō (

Izu Islands The are a group of volcanic islands stretching south and east from the Izu Peninsula of Honshū, Japan. Administratively, they form two towns and six villages; all part of Tokyo Prefecture. The largest is Izu Ōshima, usually called simply Ōsh ...

) ** Ogasawara Guntō (

Bonin Islands The Bonin Islands, also known as the , is a list of islands of Japan, Japanese archipelago of over 30 subtropical and Island#Tropical islands, tropical islands located around SSE of Tokyo and northwest of Guam. The group as a whole has a total ...

) *** Mukojima Rettō ***

Chichijima is the largest and most populous islands of Japan, island in the Japanese archipelago of Bonin Islands, Bonin or Ogasawara Islands. Chichijima is about north of Iwo Jima. in size, the island is home to about 2,120 people (2021). Connected to ...

Rettō *** Hahajima Rettō ** Kazan Rettō ( Volcano Islands) *** Kita Iwo Jima ( North Iwo Jima) ***

Iwo Jima is one of the Japanese Volcano Islands, which lie south of the Bonin Islands and together with them make up the Ogasawara Subprefecture, Ogasawara Archipelago. Together with the Izu Islands, they make up Japan's Nanpō Islands. Although sout ...

*** Minami Iwo Jima ( South Iwo Jima) *** Nishinoshima ** Okinotorishima **

Minamitorishima sometimes Minami-Tori-shima or Minami-Torishima, also known as Marcus Island, is an isolated Islands of Japan, Japanese coral atoll in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, located some southeast of Tokyo and east of the closest Japanese island, Sout ...

The

Geospatial Information Authority of Japan The , or GSI, is the national institution responsible for surveying and mapping the national land of Japan. The former name of the organization from 1949 until March 2010 was Geographical Survey Institute; despite the rename, it retains the same ...

, a government agency that is responsible for standardization of place names, does not use the term Nanpō Shotō, although it has agreed with the Japan Coast Guard over the names and extents of the subgroups of the Nanpō Shotō. The Japanese claim to have discovered the islands in 1593; however, many of the islands were known by the Spanish sailors that went from

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

New Spain New Spain, officially the Viceroyalty of New Spain ( ; Nahuatl: ''Yankwik Kaxtillan Birreiyotl''), originally the Kingdom of New Spain, was an integral territorial entity of the Spanish Empire, established by Habsburg Spain. It was one of several ...

since Bernardo de la Torre's voyage in 1543, while the British claimed the islands in 1827. However, archeological evidence has since revealed that some of the islands were prehistorically inhabited by members of an unknown Micronesian ethnicity.小笠原・火山(硫黄)列島の歴史
/ref> Neither Japan nor Britain developed the Nanpō Islands, although a small colony of Europeans and Americans was established at Chichi-jima. Japan began colonizing the islands in 1853, claimed them in 1861, then finally annexed them in 1891 as part of Tokyo Prefecture. By the mid-1930s the islands were closed to foreigners and a small

Imperial Japanese Navy The Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN; Kyūjitai: Shinjitai: ' 'Navy of the Greater Japanese Empire', or ''Nippon Kaigun'', 'Japanese Navy') was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945, Potsdam Declaration, when it was dissolved followin ...

base was established at Chichi-jima.

References

Izu–Bonin–Mariana Arc Islands of Tokyo Archipelagoes of Japan Archipelagoes of the Pacific Ocean {{Tokyo-geo-stub

See also

References