is a

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be de ...

located in

Mie Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Mie Prefecture has a population of 1,781,948 () and has a geographic area of . Mie Prefecture is bordered by Gifu Prefecture to the north, Shiga Prefecture and Kyoto Prefecture ...

, Japan. , the city had an estimated

population Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using ...

of 157,235 in 66,018 households and a

population density Population density (in agriculture: 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 geographical ...

of 250 persons per km². The total area of the city is . The city is famous for Matsusaka beef.

Geography

Matsusaka is located in east-central

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 amongst ...

, in central Mie Prefecture. It stretches the width of Mie Prefecture, and is bordered by

Ise Bay is a bay located at the mouth of the Kiso Three Rivers between Mie and Aichi Prefectures in Japan. Ise Bay has an average depth of and a maximum depth of . The mouth of the bay is and is connected to the smaller Mikawa Bay by two channels: ...

on the

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

to the east, and

Nara Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, 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 ...

to the west. Parts of the city are within the limits of the

Yoshino-Kumano National Park is a national park comprising several non-contiguous areas of Mie, Nara, and Wakayama Prefectures, Japan. Established in 1936, the park includes Mount Yoshino, celebrated for its cherry blossoms, as well as elements of the UNESCO World Heri ...

Neighboring municipalities

Mie Prefecture * Tsu * Taki * Meiwa *

Ōdai 260px, Ōsugidani Ravine is a town located in Mie Prefecture, Japan. , the town had an estimated population of 8,847 in 4,125 households and a population density of 24 persons per km2. The total area of the town was . Geography Ōdai is loca ...

Nara Prefecture * Higashiyoshino * Kawakami * Mitsue

Climate

Matsusaka has a Humid subtropical climate (Köppen ''Cfa'') characterized by warm summers and cool winters with light to no snowfall. The average annual temperature in Matsusaka is . The average annual rainfall is with September as the wettest month. The temperatures are highest on average in August, at around , and lowest in January, at around .

Demographics

Per Japanese census data,Matsusaka population statistics
/ref> the population of Matsusaka has been increasing slowly over the past 50 years.

History

Matsusaka developed as a commercial center during the

Sengoku period The was a period in Japanese history of near-constant civil war and social upheaval from 1467 to 1615. The Sengoku period was initiated by the Ōnin War in 1467 which collapsed the feudal system of Japan under the Ashikaga shogunate. Variou ...

, and

Oda Nobukatsu was a Japanese samurai of the Azuchi–Momoyama period. He was the second son of Oda Nobunaga. He survived the decline of the Oda clan from political prominence, becoming a ''daimyō'' in the early Edo period. Though often described as an inco ...

, the younger son of

Oda Nobunaga was a Japanese '' daimyō'' and one of the leading figures of the Sengoku period. He is regarded as the first "Great Unifier" of Japan. Nobunaga was head of the very powerful Oda clan, and launched a war against other ''daimyō'' to unif ...

built a

castle A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word ''castle'', but usually consider it to be the private fortified r ...

in the area in 1580. The area came under the control of Gamō Ujisato shortly thereafter, and the Gamō began construction of a castle in the and named the site "Matsusaka," meaning "slope (坂) covered with pines (松)" in 1588. Matsusaka Castle was the center of the short-lived

Matsusaka Domain is a Cities of Japan, city located in Mie Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 157,235 in 66,018 households and a population density of 250 persons per km². The total area of the city is . The city is famous for Matsusaka ...

in the early

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in ...

, but for most of 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 ...

, the castle was the eastern outpost of Kishu Domain based at Wakayama Castle. Following 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 r ...

, the area became part of Mie Prefecture. The town of Matsusaka was created on April 1, 1889 with the establishment of the modern municipalities system. The second ''

kanji are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese and are still used, along with the subse ...

'' character of Matsusaka was changed to 阪 from 坂 in those days. On March 26, 1893, 1318 houses in the town were destroyed in a fire. Matsusaka was raised to city status on February 1, 1933. The city suffered only light damage in

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 ...

, when an air raid killed four people on February 4, 1945. About 700 houses in the city were destroyed by a fire on December 16, 1951. On October 15, 1956, a major railway accident occurred at Rokken Station on the outskirts of the city, killing 42 people. On August 1, 1982, Typhoon Bess left nine people dead in its wake. The city officially celebrated its 500th anniversary in 1988. On January 1, 2005, the city expanded to its present borders, with the absorption the towns of Mikumo and Ureshino (both from Ichishi District), and the towns of Iinan and Iitaka (both from Iinan District).

Government

Matsusaka has a mayor-council form of government with a directly elected mayor and a

unicameral Unicameralism (from ''uni''- "one" + Latin ''camera'' "chamber") is a type of legislature, which consists of one house or assembly, that legislates and votes as one. Unicameral legislatures exist when there is no widely perceived need for multi ...

city council of 28 members. Matsusaka contributes four members to the Mie Prefectural Assembly. In terms of national politics, the city is part of Mie 1st district of the lower house of the

Diet of Japan The is the national legislature of Japan. It is composed of a lower house, called the House of Representatives (, ''Shūgiin''), and an upper house, the House of Councillors (, '' Sangiin''). Both houses are directly elected under a paral ...

Education

Matsusaka has 36 public elementary schools and 12 public middle schools operated by the city government and four public high schools operated by the Mie Prefectural Board of Education. There are also one private middle school and two private high schools. The prefectural also operates two special education schools for the handicapped.

Mie Chukyo University was a private university in Matsusaka, Mie, Japan, established in 1982. Formerly known as Matsusaka University, the school adopted the present name in 2005. Discountined in 2013. History The Mie Chukyo University opened as Matsusaka University ...

, formerly located in Matsusaka, closed in 2013.

Transportation

Railway

JR Tōkai –

Kisei Main Line The is a railway line that parallels the coastline of the Kii Peninsula in Japan between Mie Prefecture and Wakayama Prefecture. The name takes the '' kanji'' characters from the names of the old provinces of and . The line is operated b ...

* - -

JR Tōkai – Meishō Line * - - 20px

Kintetsu Railway , referred to as , is a Japanese passenger railway company, managing infrastructure and operating passenger train service. Its railway system is the largest in Japan, excluding Japan Railways Group. The railway network connects Osaka, Nara, Kyo ...

Osaka Line 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 2 ...

* 20px

- Nagoya Line * 20px

- Yamada Line * - - - - - -

Highway

* 24px, link=, alt=E23

Ise Expressway The is a national expressway in Mie Prefecture, Japan. It is owned and operated by Central Nippon Expressway Company. Overview Officially, the route is designated as the Kinki Expressway Ise Route, however this designation does not appear on an ...

* * * * *

Seaports

Port of Matsusaka A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ham ...

Sister city relations

* -

Binhu District Binhu District () is one of six urban districts of Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, People's Republic of China. Located in the delta hinterland of the Yangtze River to the southwest of Wuxi City, the district has an area of , of which is land, and a to ...

Wuxi Wuxi (, ) is a city in southern Jiangsu province, eastern China, by car to the northwest of downtown Shanghai, between Changzhou and Suzhou. In 2017 it had a population of 3,542,319, with 6,553,000 living in the entire prefecture-level city a ...

Jiangsu Province Jiangsu (; ; pinyin: Jiāngsū, alternatively romanized as Kiangsu or Chiangsu) is an eastern coastal province of the People's Republic of China. It is one of the leading provinces in finance, education, technology, and tourism, with its c ...

, China

Local attractions

* Matsusaka Castle ruins * Takarazuka kofun ancient burial mound *

Azaka Castle was a Japanese castle located in what is now the Oazaka neighborhood of the city of Matsusaka, Mie in the Kansai region of Japan. Its ruins were designated a National Historic Site in 1982, collectively with the ruins of Taka Castle and Karat ...

ruins

Notable people

Mitsui Takatoshi was the founder of the Mitsui family of merchants and industrialists that later emerged as the Mitsui Group, a powerful Japanese zaibatsu (business conglomerate). Life Mitsui was born in 1622, in Matsusaka, Ise Province (present-day Mat ...

, founder of the

Mitsui is one of the largest ''keiretsu'' in Japan and one of the largest corporate groups in the world. The major companies of the group include Mitsui & Co. (general trading company), Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, Nippon Paper Industries ...

group. *

Motoori Norinaga was a Japanese scholar of '' Kokugaku'' active during the Edo period. He is conventionally ranked as one of the Four Great Men of Kokugaku (nativist) studies. Life Norinaga was born in what is now Matsusaka in Ise Province (now part of M ...

,Edo period kokugaku scholar *

Matsuura Takeshirō was a Japanese explorer, cartographer, writer, painter, priest, and antiquarian. During the late Edo period and Bakumatsu he journeyed six times to Ezo, including to Sakhalin and the Kuriles. In the early Meiji period he was an official ...

explorer Exploration refers to the historical practice of discovering remote lands. It is studied by geographers and historians. Two major eras of exploration occurred in human history: one of convergence, and one of divergence. The first, covering most ...

cartographer Cartography (; from grc, χάρτης , "papyrus, sheet of paper, map"; and , "write") is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality (or an i ...

writer A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, pla ...

painter Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ...

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particu ...

, and antiquarian *

Tetsuo Morimoto is a Japanese politician of the Democratic Party of Japan, a member of the House of Representatives of Japan, House of Representatives in the Diet of Japan, Diet (national legislature). A native of Iinan, Mie and graduate of Tsu City College, he ...

, politician * Masaharu Nakagawa, politician * Kana Nishino,J-pop/R&B singer *

Norihisa Tamura is a Japanese politician who served as the Minister of Health, Labour, and Welfare from September 2020 to October 2021. He is also a member of the House of Representatives representing Mie's 4th district since 1996. Early life and education ...

, politician *

Ben Wada Ben Wada (和田勉 ''Wada Ben''), born ''Tsutomu Wada'', (June 3, 1930January 14, 2011) was a producer for the Japanese TV channel NHK. He was the husband of the costume designer Emi Wada. Biography Ben Wada was born in Matsusaka, Mie Prefectur ...

, film director *

Ikuzo Saito is a Japanese former wrestler who competed in the 1984 Summer Olympics and in the 1988 Summer Olympics The 1988 Summer Olympics (), officially known as the Games of the XXIV Olympiad () and commonly known as Seoul 1988 ( ko, 서울 1988 ...

, Olympic wrestler * Satoshi Hida, professional soccer player *

Keisuke Funatani is a Japanese football player. Club career Mito HollyHock Funatani left Mito HollyHock at the end of 2018. This was announced on 3 December 2018. FC Maruyasu Okazaki On 7 February 2019, Funatani joined FC Maruyasu Okazaki , playing as , is ...

, professional soccer player * Mienoumi Tsuyoshi, sumo wrestler * Hiroki Mizumoto, professional soccer player * Yotsukasa Dai, sumo wrestler * Aki Deguchi, J-pop idol and singer

References

External links

*
Matsusaka city guide
from th
Mie Guidebook
a
Mie JETs
{{Authority control Cities in Mie Prefecture Populated coastal places in Japan Port settlements in Japan Populated places established in 1588