The (or 先島群島, ''Sakishima-guntō'') ( Okinawan: ''Sachishima'', Miyako: ''Saksїzїma'', Yaeyama: ''Sakїzїma'',

Yonaguni , one of the Yaeyama Islands, is the westernmost inhabited island of Japan, lying from the east coast of Taiwan, between the East China Sea and the Pacific Ocean proper. The island is administered as the town of Yonaguni, Yaeyama Gun, O ...

: ''Satichima'') are an archipelago located at the southernmost end of the Japanese Archipelago. They are part of 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 ...

and include the

Miyako Islands The (also Miyako Jima group) are a group of islands in Okinawa Prefecture, Japan, belonging to the Ryukyu Islands. They are situated between the Okinawa Island and Yaeyama Islands. In the early 1870s, the population of the islands was esti ...

and the

Yaeyama Islands The Yaeyama Islands (八重山列島 ''Yaeyama-rettō'', also 八重山諸島 ''Yaeyama-shotō'', Yaeyama: ''Yaima'', Yonaguni: ''Daama'', Okinawan: ''Yeema'', Northern Ryukyuan: ''Yapema'') are an archipelago in the southwest of Okinawa P ...

. The islands are administered as part of

Okinawa Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan. Okinawa Prefecture is the southernmost and westernmost prefecture of Japan, has a population of 1,457,162 (as of 2 February 2020) and a geographic area of 2,281 km2 (880 sq mi). Naha is the capital and largest cit ...

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 ...

Inhabited islands

Sakishima Islands *

(former Miyako Subprefecture) ** Flag of Miyakojima, Okinawa

Miyakojima City ***

Ikema Island , is located to the north of Miyako Island in Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. The island is connected to Miyako Island with a bridge (), which was completed in February 1992. There is a pond in the centre of the island. To the north-east is the . ...

(''Ikema-jima'') *** Irabu Island (''Irabu-jima'') ***

Kurima Island , ( Miyako: ''Ffyama'') is one of the Miyako Islands of Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. It is connected to Miyako-jima via 1,690m Kurima Bridge (). Gallery Miyako kurima.JPG, Kurima-jima Kurimajima Miyakojima Okinawa Japan02n4500.jpg, Bridge ...

(''Kurima-jima'') ***

Miyako Island is the largest and the most populous island among the Miyako Islands of Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. Miyako Island is administered as part of the City of Miyakojima, which includes not only Miyako Island, but also five other populated island ...

(''Miyako-jima'') ***

Ōgami Island are the deities, divinities, spirits, phenomena or "holy powers", that are venerated in the Shinto religion. They can be elements of the landscape, forces of nature, or beings and the qualities that these beings express; they can also be the ...

(''Ōgami-jima'') ***

Shimoji Island , ( Miyako: ''Sïmuzï'') is one of the Miyako Islands, a part of the Ryukyu Islands. The island is administered by Miyakojima, Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. The island is connected to Irabu Island via . Shimoji-shima is included within the Ira ...

(''Shimoji-shima'') ** Flag of Tarama, Okinawa

Tarama Village ***Tarama Island (''Tarama-jima'') *** Minna Island (''Minna-jima'') *

(former Yaeyama Subprefecture) ** Flag of Ishigaki, Okinawa

Ishigaki City ***

Ishigaki Island , also known as ''Ishigakijima'', is a Japanese island south-west of Okinawa Hontō and the second-largest island of the Yaeyama Island group, behind Iriomote Island. It is located approximately south-west of Okinawa Hontō. It is within the ...

(''Ishigaki-jima'') ** Flag of Taketomi, Okinawa

Taketomi Town *** Aragusuku Island (''Aragusuku-jima'') *** Hateruma Island (''Hateruma-jima'') *** Iriomote Island (''Iriomote-jima'') *** Kohama Island (''Kohama-jima'') *** Kuroshima Island (''Kuroshima'') *** Taketomi Island (''Taketomi-jima'') ***

Yubu Island ''Yubu'', translated as Pace(s) of Yu or Step(s) of Yu, is the basic mystic dance step of religious Daoism. This ancient walking or dancing technique typically involves dragging one foot after another, and is explained in reference to the leg ...

(''Yubu-jima'') ** Flag of Yonaguni, Okinawa

Yonaguni Town *** Yonaguni Island (''Yonaguni-jima'') File:Miyako ikema bridge.JPG, Ikema Bridge, between Miyako and Ikema File:Shimojijima-airport.jpg, Shimoji File:Tarama.JPG, Tarama File:Kabira Bay Ishigaki Island39bs3s4500.jpg, Ishigaki File:Village in Taketomi Island - located at southwest Japan.jpg,

Taketomi is an island in the town of Taketomi, within Yaeyama District of Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. Taketomi is one of the Yaeyama Islands. The population of Taketomi Island was 323 as of January 2012. Geography Taketomi Island is located south of Is ...

File:黒島Img499.jpg, Kuroshima File:Funauki iriomote island.jpg,

Iriomote is the largest of the Yaeyama Islands of Japan, and the second largest in Okinawa Prefecture after Okinawa Island itself. The island has an area of and a 2005 population of 2,347. The island does not have an airstrip, and most visitors — ...

File:Yonaguni agarizaki.jpg,

History

The Sakishima Islands were first documented in the ''

Shoku Nihongi The is an imperially-commissioned Japanese history text. Completed in 797, it is the second of the '' Six National Histories'', coming directly after the '' Nihon Shoki'' and followed by '' Nihon Kōki''. Fujiwara no Tsugutada and Sugano no Ma ...

'' (797), which says that in 714 paid tribute to Dazaifu with 52 islanders from , , and other islands. ''Shigaki'' is believed to be the current , ''Kumi'' to be the current or settlement of

.Shimoji Kazuhiro 下地和宏, ''Tōji bōeki to Miyako'' 陶磁交易と宮古, Nichiryū bōeki no reimei 日琉交易の黎明, pp. 327–346, 2008. The '' History of Yuan'' (1370) documented a castaway from ''Mìyágǔ'' (密牙古) arrived to

Wenzhou Wenzhou (pronounced ; Wenzhounese: Yuziou �y33–11 tɕiɤu33–32 ), historically known as Wenchow is a prefecture-level city in southeastern Zhejiang province in the People's Republic of China. Wenzhou is located at the extreme south east o ...

in 1317. This is believed to be the first documentation of . Stone tools and shell tools from 2,500 years ago have been excavated from shell mounds on the Sakishima Islands. Shell tools of the same era are also found in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...

and the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

, but not on

Okinawa Island is the largest of the Okinawa Islands and the Ryukyu (''Nansei'') Islands of Japan in the Kyushu region. It is the smallest and least populated of the five main islands of Japan. The island is approximately long, an average wide, and has an ...

or Amami. Thus those islands are thought to have had a stronger or closer cultural relationship with Taiwan, the Philippines, and other regions which are Austronesian-speaking. Local earthenware was made beginning in the 11th century. Many local leaders, known as '' aji'', appeared in the 15th century. At the same time, the political authorities on Okinawa saw the outlying islands as useful stopping points along a maritime trade route, and gradually enhanced their influence. unified Miyako in 1365, and paid tribute to Satto, the king of the

Chūzan was one of three kingdoms which controlled Okinawa in the 14th century. Okinawa, previously controlled by a number of local chieftains or lords, loosely bound by a paramount chieftain or king of the entire island, split into these three more ...

kingdom of Okinawa.

Ryukyuan control

In 1500, , ''Aji'' of Ishigaki, unified most of the

and rose up in resistance against the Ryukyu Kingdom by refusing to pay further tribute. As he was planning to invade Miyako, , ''Aji'' of Miyako, discovered the plan and launched a preemptive invasion of the Yaeyama Islands. Oyake Akahachi was defeated at Furusutobaru Castle, and Nakasone Tuyumya went on to conquer

. King

Shō Shin was a king of the Ryukyu Kingdom, the third ruler the second Shō dynasty. Shō Shin's long reign has been described as "the Great Days of Chūzan", a period of great peace and relative prosperity. He was the son of Shō En, the founder of the d ...

of Ryukyu responded to the initial rebellion by sending troops, but they arrived at Miyako after most of the fighting had ended. The Ryukyuan army consisted of 3,000 soldiers and 100 ships; Nakasone Tuyumya chose to surrender instead of fighting, handing over all of the Sakishima Islands to Ryukyu. The

Shimazu clan The were the '' daimyō'' of the Satsuma han, which spread over Satsuma, Ōsumi and Hyūga provinces in Japan. The Shimazu were identified as one of the '' tozama'' or outsider ''daimyō'' familiesAppert, Georges ''et al.'' (1888). in cont ...

of the Japanese feudal domain of Satsuma invaded the kingdom during the 1609

Invasion of Ryukyu The by forces of the Japanese feudal domain of Satsuma took place from March to May of 1609, and marked the beginning of the Ryukyu Kingdom's status as a vassal state under the Satsuma domain. The invasion force was met with stiff resistan ...

. Satsuma was able to capture Shuri Castle and King

Shō Nei was king of the Ryukyu Kingdom from 1587 to 1620. He reigned during the 1609 invasion of Ryukyu and was the first king of Ryukyu to be a vassal to the Shimazu clan of Satsuma, a Japanese feudal domain. Shō Nei was the great-grandson of Sh ...

by early May, then sent a message to the Sakishima Islands demanding their surrender, which they complied with. In the following centuries of vassalage to Satsuma, the Ryukyuan government was placed under extreme tax pressure, and instituted a heavy

poll tax A poll tax, also known as head tax or capitation, is a tax levied as a fixed sum on every liable individual (typically every adult), without reference to income or resources. Head taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments f ...

in the Sakishima Islands. As a result of the extreme economic conditions,

infanticide Infanticide (or infant homicide) is the intentional killing of infants or offspring. Infanticide was a widespread practice throughout human history that was mainly used to dispose of unwanted children, its main purpose is the prevention of resou ...

and other methods of population control became common, as they did throughout the Ryukyu Islands; remains of the sites where this took place can still be found throughout the Sakishima Islands. Yaeyama islanders were taxed even more heavily than those of Miyako, as the rebel Oyake Akahachi was from Yaeyama. The kingdom prohibited migration of islanders, isolating them to prevent group resistance. The Yaeyama earthquake in 1771 caused a

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater exp ...

which killed 12,000, or a half of the entire Sakishima population. Because the soil was adversely affected by salination, famines were frequent, and the population of the islands further decreased until the early

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

Japanese control

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 ...

, in 1872, the Japanese government unilaterally declared that the Ryukyu Kingdom was then

Ryukyu Domain The was a short-lived domain of the Empire of Japan, lasting from 1872 to 1879, before becoming the current Okinawa Prefecture and other islands at the Pacific edge of the East China Sea. When the domain was created in 1872, Japan's feudal han ...

and began incorporating the islands as a part of Japan. In 1879, after the Ryukyuan government resisted and disobeyed orders from Tokyo, Japan abolished the domain, deposed the king, and established

. The

Qing Dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...

, however, opposed the action, claiming sovereignty over the former kingdom. Japan proposed to cede the Sakishima Islands, provided China add " most favored nation" status of Japan to the Sino-Japanese Treaty of Amity. China agreed at first, but after objections from Viceroy Li Hongzhang, the agreement was not made. China effectively conceded its claims to sovereignty over Ryukyu, including the Sakishima Islands, following its defeat by Japan in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95. The modernization of Sakishima by the Japanese government was slow compared with Japan or even Okinawa. The heavy poll tax continued until as late as 1903. Meanwhile, the islands, as well as

, used Western Standard Time ( UTC+8) until 1937, 1 hour behind the Central Standard Time of Japan ( UTC+9). Yaeyama Islands Notice board in 1945

During

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 World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, there was an air battle waged against the Sakishima Islands' two largest islands that lasted for 82 days in order to neutralize

Kamikaze , officially , were a part of the Japanese Special Attack Units of military aviators who flew suicide attacks for the Empire of Japan against Allied naval vessels in the closing stages of the Pacific campaign of World War II, intending ...

airfields.Miyako US and British Military History Ref. Declassified US Naval records and National Archives holdings compiled in "Wings over Sakishima" by Fredio Samples, Author's permission granted. Twenty-five US

escort carrier The escort carrier or escort aircraft carrier (U.S. hull classification symbol CVE), also called a "jeep carrier" or "baby flattop" in the United States Navy (USN) or "Woolworth Carrier" by the Royal Navy, was a small and slow type of aircraft ...

s, five larger fast carriers with their air groups consisting of fighters and torpedo bombers along with heavy naval patrol bombers and an assortment of DD-Destroyers and DE-Destroyer Escorts along with the

British Pacific Fleet The British Pacific Fleet (BPF) was a Royal Navy formation that saw action against Japan during the Second World War. The fleet was composed of empire naval vessels. The BPF formally came into being on 22 November 1944 from the remaining ships o ...

bombed, rocketed and fired their guns at runways and other targets daily while the land battle raged on Okinawa 175 miles away. This was the least publicized battle for its size that took place involving the Americans and British during the war. The thirty-two thousand seasoned

Imperial Japanese Army The was the official ground-based armed force of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945. It was controlled by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office and the Ministry of the Army, both of which were nominally subordinate to the Emper ...

(IJA) and

Naval A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and related functions. It inclu ...

(IJN) troops on Miyako did not surrender until 27 days after Japan formally surrendered. The amount of ordnance expended against the Sakishima Islands may have exceeded the ordnance spent on the island of Iwo Jima. The Sakishima Islands did not suffer a ground invasion during World War II, although a great deal of anti-submarine warfare and convoy battles took place in the waters immediately surrounding the archipelago in the years leading up to the Okinawa campaign. A number of American and Japanese submarines were lost on the approaches to these islands as they formed a vital outlying defense to the Empire's shipping bottlenecks in the Formosa (Taiwan) and Luzon Straits. In June 1945, the Japanese government ordered locals to evacuate to northern Ishigaki and Iriomote, where 3,647 of them lost their lives to

malaria Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects humans and other animals. Malaria causes symptoms that typically include fever, tiredness, vomiting, and headaches. In severe cases, it can cause jaundice, seizures, coma, or death. ...

. In contrast, air raids killed much fewer: 174. After the

was defeated on Okinawa later that month, there was a vacuum of military and government control in the Sakishima Islands. Some garrison troops robbed crops from farms or engaged in violence against locals. To counter them, the residents of Ishigaki formed the . Since it acted as a temporary local government, some historians later described the association as the .

American control

United States Occupation authorities declared the establishment of military rule in December 1945, restoring Miyako Subprefecture and Yaeyama Subprefecture. The local association ceased operation. In 1952, the

Treaty of San Francisco The , also called the , re-established peaceful relations between Japan and the Allied Powers on behalf of the United Nations by ending the legal state of war and providing for redress for hostile actions up to and including World War II. It w ...

confirmed these islands to be under American control. Malaria was eradicated from the island in 1961. The islands were returned to Japan in 1972, along with the rest of Okinawa Prefecture.

Today

Today the Sakishima Islands enjoy a thriving tourist industry. As part of the Sakishima Islands are the

Senkaku Islands The are a group of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea, administered by Japan. They are located northeast of Taiwan, east of China, west of Okinawa Island, and north of the southwestern end of the Ryukyu Islands. They are known in main ...

, which fall under Okinawa Prefecture and Ishigaki City politically. The

Japanese Self Defense Force The Japan Self-Defense Forces ( ja, 自衛隊, Jieitai; abbreviated JSDF), also informally known as the Japanese Armed Forces, are the unified ''de facto''Since Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution outlaws the formation of armed forces, the ...

and Japan Coast Guard maintain a large presence in the Sakishima Islands.

Culture

There are three native languages on the islands; Miyako language on the Miyako Islands, Yonaguni language on Yonaguni, and Yaeyama language on the other Yaeyama Islands. All these languages belong to the Southern Ryukyuan branch of the

Ryukyuan languages The , also Lewchewan or Luchuan (), are the indigenous languages of the Ryukyu Islands, the southernmost part of the Japanese archipelago. Along with the Japanese language and the Hachijō language, they make up the Japonic language family. ...

group, which in turn belong to the Japonic languages group. These languages are not mutually intelligible. As on Okinawa, therefore, standard

Japanese language is spoken natively by about 128 million people, primarily by Japanese people and primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language. Japanese belongs to the Japonic or Japanese- Ryukyuan language family. There have been ...

is used in formal situations, while

Okinawan Japanese is the Japanese language as spoken by the people of Okinawa Islands. Okinawan Japanese's accents and words are influenced by the traditional Okinawan and Kunigami languages. Okinawan Japanese has some loanwords from American English due to ...

, that is, standard Japanese with native Ryukyuan words, pronunciation changes, etc. mixed in, is quite commonly used as well.

References

External links

*
八重山地方の歴史
(The history of Yaeyama region) an

(The history of Miyako region) fro
mahae plus
Okinawa Convention & Visitors Bureau official website {{DEFAULTSORT:Sakishima Islands Ryukyu Islands Archipelagoes of Japan Islands of Okinawa Prefecture Archipelagoes of the Pacific Ocean