is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

in Kunigami District,

Okinawa Prefecture is the southernmost and westernmost prefecture of Japan. It consists of three main island groups—the Okinawa Islands, the Sakishima Islands, and the Daitō Islands—spread across a maritime zone approximately 1,000 kilometers east to west an ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. It occupies the north tip of

Okinawa Island , officially , is the largest of the Okinawa Islands and the Ryukyu Islands, Ryukyu (''Nansei'') Islands of Japan in the Kyushu region. It is the smallest and least populated of the five Japanese archipelago, main islands of Japan. The island is ...

, with the

East China Sea The East China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean, located directly offshore from East China. China names the body of water along its eastern coast as "East Sea" (, ) due to direction, the name of "East China Sea" is otherwise ...

to the west,

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

to the east, and

villages A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban village ...

Higashi Higashi (Japanese 東 ''east'') may refer to: Places in Japan *Higashi, Shibuya *Higashi, Fukushima *Higashi, Okinawa *Higashi-ku, Fukuoka *Higashi-ku, Hiroshima *Higashi-ku, Nagoya *Higashi-ku, Sapporo People *Keigo Higashi, Japanese footballer ...

and

Ōgimi is a village located in Kunigami District, Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. As of October 2016, the village has an estimated population of 3,024 and a population density of 51 persons per km2. The total area is . Several censuses have established ...

to the south. As of 2015, the village has a

population Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...

of 4,908 and a

population density Population density (in agriculture: Standing 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 geog ...

of 25.20 persons per km². The total area is 194.80 km².

History

According to ''

Chūzan Seikan , compiled in 1650 by Shō Shōken, is the first official history of the Ryūkyū Kingdom. In six scrolls, the main text occupies five and an accompanying summary the sixth. Unlike later official histories such as ''Chūzan Seifu'' and '' Kyūy� ...

'', the

goddess A goddess is a female deity. In some faiths, a sacred female figure holds a central place in religious prayer and worship. For example, Shaktism (one of the three major Hinduism, Hindu sects), holds that the ultimate deity, the source of all re ...

Amamikyu , or , is the creation goddess of the Ryukyu Islands in the Ryukyuan religion. Name Amamikyu's name comes from the reading of the Chinese characters 阿摩美久 or 阿摩彌姑, which were most likely written ad hoc for the Okinawan pronunciati ...

consecrated the first

utaki Utaki (御嶽) is an Okinawan language, Okinawan term for a sacred place, often a Grove (nature), grove, cave, or mountain. They are central to the Ryukyuan religion and the former Noro (priestess), noro priestess system. Although the term ''utak ...

in Asa Forest at Hedo, in what is now Kunigami; the forest is also mentioned in ''

Omoro Sōshi The is a compilation of ancient poems and songs from Okinawa and the Amami Islands, collected into 22 volumes and written primarily in hiragana with some simple kanji. There are 1,553 poems in the collection, but many are repeated; the number o ...

''. Ceramics from the Jōmon-period resemble those found in the

Amami Islands The The name ''Amami-guntō'' was standardized on February 15, 2010. Prior to that, another name, ''Amami shotō'' (奄美諸島), was also used. is a Japanese archipelago in the Satsunan Islands, which is part of the Ryukyu Islands, and is sout ...

. ''Chūzan Seikan'' records the prayers of the Kunigami council for the recovery of

Shō Sei was king of the Ryukyu Kingdom from 1526 to 1555.Kerr, George H. (2000). He was the fifth son of King Shō Shin, who he succeeded. Life Shō Sei suppressed a rebellion on Amami Ōshima in 1537 and took steps to improve defenses against '' wak ...

after an abortive attempt to occupy

Amami Ōshima , also known as Amami, is the largest island in the Amami Islands, Amami archipelago between Kyūshū and Okinawa Prefecture, Okinawa. It is one of the Satsunan Islands, all of which belong to Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan. The island, 712.35 ...

in 1537, while ''

Kyūyō is an official history of the Ryūkyū Kingdom compiled between 1743 and 1745 by a group of scholar-officials led by . Written in kanbun, and numbering twenty-two scrolls, a supplementary volume in three scrolls documents relations with Satsuma, w ...

'' recounts the appointment of the son of the Kunigami Oyakata as '' aji'' after the successful takeover of the Amami Islands by

Shō Gen was king of the Ryukyu Kingdom from 1556 to 1572. He was called "Gen, the mute."Kerr, George H. (2000). Life The king required considerable support from the ''Sanshikan'' (Council of Three), the chief council of royal advisors. His reign ma ...

in 1571. Kunigami District was established in 1896 and, upon the abolition of Kunigami magiri, Kunigami Village was founded in 1908. During the

Battle of Okinawa The , codenamed Operation Iceberg, was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa Island, Okinawa by United States Army and United States Marine Corps forces against the Imperial Japanese Army during the Pacific War, Impe ...

, the area saw an influx of refugees fleeing the heavy fighting in the south. In September 1945, the occupying government merged the three villages of Kunigami,

, and

into the new city of ; the merger was reversed the following year.

Geography

Kunigami is mountainous, with over 80% of the land area covered by subtropical evergreen forest.

Endemic species Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

include the

Okinawa woodpecker The is a woodpecker endemic to the Okinawa Prefecture of Japan. Taxonomy Other common names for this species are Noguchi's woodpecker, Okinawan woodpecker, Pryer's woodpecker and Ryukyu woodpecker. It was previously placed in the monotypic g ...

and

Okinawa rail The Okinawa rail (''Hypotaenidia okinawae'') is a species of bird in the rail family, Rallidae. It is endemic to Okinawa Island in Japan where it is known as the . Its existence was only confirmed in 1978 and it was formally described in 1981 al ...

. * Mount Yonaha (503 m), the highest mountain on Okinawa Island * (420 m) * (395 m) * * * *

Cape Hedo , also known as Hedo Point, is the northernmost point on Okinawa Island, located within Kunigami Village. A cape jutting out north from the island, it faces the East China Sea on the west, and the Pacific Ocean on the east. On a particularly cl ...

* *

Camp Gonsalves Camp Gonsalves is a U.S. Marine Corps jungle warfare training area located in northern Okinawa, Japan, across the villages of Kunigami and Higashi. Established in 1958, it is the largest U.S. training facility in Okinawa. The camp is located i ...

Yanbaru National Park is a national park in Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. Established in 2016, it is located in and around the forested region of Yambaru at the northern end of Okinawa Island. The park comprises a land area of in the villages of Kunigami, Ōgimi, and ...

Administrative divisions

The village includes twenty-one wards. *Ada (安田) *Aha (安波) *Benoki (辺野喜) *Gaji (我地) *Ginama (宜名真) *Hama (浜) *Hanji (半地) *Hedo (辺戸) *Hentona (辺土名) *Hiji (比地) *Iji (伊地) *Jashiki (謝敷) *Kaganji (鏡地) *Oku (奥) *Okuma (奥間) *Sate (佐手) *Sosu (楚洲) *Tōbaru (桃原) *Uka (宇嘉) *Ura (宇良) *Yona (与那)

Neighbouring municipalities

Climate

Demographics

Education

There is one municipal junior high school, Kunigami Junior High School ( 国頭中学校). Kunigami has the following municipal elementary schools: * Ada (安田小学校) * Aha (安波小学校) * Hentona (辺土名小学校) * Oku (奥小学校) * Okuma (奥間小学校) The following municipal elementary schools are permanently closed: *Kitaguni Elementary School (北国小学校) *Sate Elementary School (佐手小学校) There is one municipal kindergarten, Kunigami Nursery School (くにがみこども園).

Cultural Properties

*Name (Japanese) (Type of registration)

Cultural Properties Cultural property, also known as cultural patrimony, comprises the physical items that are part of the cultural heritage of a group or society, as opposed to less tangible cultural expressions. They include such items as cultural landscapes, histo ...

*King Gihon's Tomb ( 義本王の墓) (Municipal) *Uzahama Site ( 宇佐浜遺跡) (Municipal)

Natural Monuments Nature is an inherent character or constitution, particularly of the ecosphere or the universe as a whole. In this general sense nature refers to the laws, elements and phenomena of the physical world, including life. Although humans are part ...

*Ada northern yellow boxwood forest reserve (安田のアカテツ保安林) (Municipal) *Aha looking-glass mangrove trees Heritiera littoralis (安波のサキシマスオウノキ) (Prefectural) *Aha Tanagā-gumui plant community (安波のタナガーグムイの植物群落) (National) *Hiji Kodama-mui plant community (比地の小玉森の植物群落) (Prefectural) *Mount Yonaha Natural Protected Area (与那覇岳天然保護区域) (National)

Sister cities

* ― Yoron, Japan, since November 21, 2022 * ― Iwami, Japan, since July 16, 2023

References

External links

Kunigami official website
{{Authority control Villages in Okinawa Prefecture