Mount Fuji

is an active stratovolcano located on the Japanese island of Honshu, with a summit elevation of . It is the highest mountain in Japan, the second-highest volcano on any Asian island (after Mount Kerinci on the Indonesian island of Sumatra), and seventh-highest peak of an island on Earth.

Mount Fuji last erupted from 1707 to 1708. It is located about southwest of Tokyo, from where it is visible on clear days. Its exceptionally symmetrical cone, which is covered in snow for about five months of the year, is a Japanese cultural icon and is frequently depicted in art and photography, as well as visited by sightseers, hikers and mountain climbers.

Mount Fuji is one of Japan's along with Mount Tate and Mount Haku. It is a Special Place of Scenic Beauty and one of Japan's Historic Sites. It was added to the World Heritage List as a Cultural Site on June 22, 2013. According to UNESCO, Mount Fuji has "inspired artists and poets and been the object of pilgrimage for centuries". UNESCO recognizes 25 sites of cultural interest within the Mount Fuji locality. These 25 locations include Mount Fuji and the Shinto shrine, Fujisan Hongū Sengen Taisha.

Etymology

The current ''kanji'' for Mount Fuji, and , mean "wealth" or "abundant" and "man of status" respectively. The origins of this spelling and the name ''Fuji'' continue to be debated.

A text of the 9th century, '' Tale of the Bamboo Cutter'', says that the name came from and also from the image of ascending the slopes of the mountain. An early folk etymology claims that ''Fuji'' came from (''not'' + ''two''), meaning ''without equal'' or ''nonpareil''. Another claims that it came from (''not'' + ''to exhaust''), meaning ''never-ending''.

Hirata Atsutane, a Japanese classical scholar in the Edo period, speculated that the name is from a word meaning "a mountain standing up shapely as an of a rice plant". British missionary John Batchelor (1855–1944) argued that the name is from the Ainu word for "fire" (''fuchi'') of the fire deity Kamui Fuchi, which was denied by a Japanese linguist Kyōsuke Kindaichi on the grounds of phonetic development (sound change). It is also pointed out that ''huchi'' means an "old woman" and ''ape'' is the word for "fire", ''ape huchi kamuy'' being the fire deity. Research on the distribution of place names that include ''fuji'' also suggests the origin of the word ''fuji'' is in the Yamato language rather than Ainu. Japanese toponymist Kanji Kagami argued that the name has the same root as and , and came from its "long well-shaped slope".


Modern linguist Alexander Vovin proposes an alternative hypothesis based on Old Japanese reading : the word may have been borrowed from Eastern Old Japanese 火主, meaning "fire master".

Variations

In English, the mountain is known as Mount Fuji. Some sources refer to it as "Fuji-san", "Fujiyama" or, redundantly, "Mt. Fujiyama". Japanese speakers refer to the mountain as "Fuji-san". This "san" is not the honorific suffix used with people's names, such as Watanabe-san, but the Sino-Japanese reading of the character used in Sino-Japanese compounds. In Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki romanization, the name is transliterated as ''Huzi''.

Other Japanese names which have become obsolete or poetic include , , , and , created by combining the first character of , ''Fuji'', and , ''mountain''.

History

Mount Fuji is widely regarded to have an attractive volcanic cone. It has been a frequent subject of Japanese art, especially after 1600, when Edo (now Tokyo) became the capital and people saw the mountain while traveling on the Tōkaidō road. According to the historian H. Byron Earhart, "in medieval times it eventually came to be seen by Japanese as the "number one" mountain of the known world of the three countries of India, China, and Japan". The mountain is mentioned in Japanese literature throughout the ages and is the subject of many poems.

The summit has been thought of as sacred since ancient times, and was therefore forbidden to women. It was not until 1872 that the Japanese government issued an edict (May 4, 1872, Grand Council of State Edict 98) stating, "Any remaining practices of female exclusion on shrine and temple lands shall be immediately abolished, and mountain climbing for worship, etc., shall be permitted." Tatsu Takayama, a Japanese woman, became the first woman on record to summit Mount Fuji in the fall of 1832.

Ancient samurai used the base of the mountain as a remote training area, near the present-day town of Gotemba. The ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo held '' yabusame'' archery contests in the area in the early Kamakura period.

The first ascent by a foreigner was by Sir Rutherford Alcock in September 1860, who ascended the mountain in 8 hours and descended in 3 hours. Alcock's brief narrative in ''The Capital of the Tycoon'' was the first widely disseminated description of the mountain in the West. Lady Fanny Parkes, the wife of British ambassador Sir Harry Parkes, was the first non-Japanese woman to ascend Mount Fuji, in 1867. Photographer Felix Beato climbed Mount Fuji two years later.

On March 5, 1966, BOAC Flight 911, a Boeing 707, broke up in flight and crashed near the Mount Fuji Gotemba New fifth station, shortly after departure from Tokyo International Airport. All 113 passengers and 11 crew members died in the disaster, which was attributed to the extreme clear-air turbulence caused by lee waves downwind of the mountain. There is a memorial for the crash victims a short distance down from the Gotemba New Fifth Station.

Today, Mount Fuji is an international destination for tourism and mountain climbing. In the early 20th century, populist educator Frederick Starr's Chautauqua lectures about his several ascents of Mount Fuji— in 1913, 1919, and 1923—were widely known in America. A well-known Japanese saying suggests that a wise person will climb Mt. Fuji once in their lifetime, but only a fool would climb it twice. It remains a popular symbol in Japanese culture, including making numerous movie appearances, inspiring the Infiniti logo, and even appearing in medicine with the Mount Fuji sign.

In September 2004, the staffed weather station at the summit was closed after 72 years in operation. Observers monitored radar sweeps that detected typhoons and heavy rains. The station, which was the highest in Japan at , was replaced by a fully automated meteorological system.

Mount Fuji was added to the World Heritage List as a Cultural Site on June 22, 2013.

Geography

Mount Fuji is a very distinctive feature of the geography of Japan. It stands tall and is located near the Pacific coast of central Honshu, just southwest of Tokyo. It straddles the boundary of Shizuoka and Yamanashi prefectures. Four small cities surround it - Gotemba to the east, Fujiyoshida to the north, Fujinomiya to the southwest, and Fuji to the south - as well as several towns and villages in the area. It is surrounded by five lakes: Lake Kawaguchi, Lake Yamanaka, Lake Sai, Lake Motosu and Lake Shōji. They, and nearby Lake Ashi in Kanagawa Prefecture, provide expansive views of the mountain. The mountain is part of the Fuji-Hakone-Izu National Park. It can be seen more distantly from Yokohama, Tokyo, and sometimes as far as Chiba, Saitama, Tochigi, Ibaraki and Lake Hamana when the sky is clear. It has been photographed from space during a space shuttle mission.

Climate

The summit of Mount Fuji has a tundra climate (Köppen climate classification ''ET''). The temperature is very low at high altitude, and the cone is covered by snow for several months of the year. The lowest recorded temperature is recorded in February 1981, and the highest temperature was recorded in August 1942.

Fuji's seasonal snowcap begins at an average date of 2 October. In 2024, the snowcap formed on 6 November, the latest-occurring since records began in 1894.

Geology

Mount Fuji is located at a triple junction trench where the Amurian Plate, Okhotsk Plate, and Philippine Sea Plate meet. These three plates form the western part of Japan, the eastern part of Japan, and the Izu Peninsula respectively. The Pacific Plate is being subducted beneath these plates, resulting in volcanic activity. Mount Fuji is also located near three island arcs: the Southwestern Japan Arc, the Northeastern Japan Arc, and the Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc. The Fuji triple junction is only from the Boso triple junction.

Fuji's main crater is in diameter and deep. The bottom of the crater is in diameter. Slope angles from the crater to a distance of are 31°–35°, the angle of repose for dry gravel. Beyond this distance, slope angles are about 27°, which is caused by an increase in scoria. Mid-flank slope angles decrease from 23° to less than 10° in the piedmont.

Scientists have identified four distinct phases of volcanic activity in the formation of Mount Fuji. The first phase, called ''Sen-komitake'', is composed of an andesite core recently discovered deep within the mountain. ''Sen-komitake'' was followed by the "''Komitake'' Fuji", a basalt layer believed to have formed several hundred thousand years ago. Approximately 100,000 years ago, "Old Fuji" was formed over the top of ''Komitake'' Fuji. The modern, "New Fuji" is believed to have formed over the top of Old Fuji around 10,000 years ago.

Pre-Komitake started erupting in the Middle Pleistocene in an area north of Mount Fuji. After a relatively short pause, eruptions began again, which formed Komitake Volcano in the same location. These eruptions ended 100,000 years ago. Ashitaka Volcano was active from 400,000 to 100,000 years ago and is located southeast of Mount Fuji. Mount Fuji started erupting 100,000 years ago, with Ko-Fuji (old-Fuji) forming 100,000 to 17,000 years ago, but it is now almost completely buried. A large landslide on the southwest flank occurred about 18,000 years ago. Shin-Fuji (new-Fuji) eruptions in the form of lava, lapilli, and volcanic ash have occurred between 17,000 and 8,000 years ago, between 7,000 and 3,500 years ago, and between 4,000 and 2,000 years ago. Flank eruptions, mostly in the form of parasitic cinder cones, ceased in 1707. The largest cone, Omuro-Yama, is one of more than 100 cones aligned NW-SE and NE-SW through the summit. Mt. Fuji also has more than 70 lava tunnels and extensive lava tree molds. Two large landslides are at the head of the Yoshida-Osawa and Osawa-Kuzure valleys.

, the volcano is classified as active with a low risk of eruption. The last recorded eruption was the Hōei eruption which started on December 16, 1707 (''Hōei 4, 23rd day of the 11th month''), and ended about January 1, 1708 (''Hōei 4, 9th day of the 12th month''). The eruption formed a new crater and a second peak, named Mount Hōei, halfway down its southeastern side. Fuji spewed cinders and ash which simulated rainfall in Izu, Kai, Sagami, and Musashi. Since then, there have been no signs of an eruption. On the evening of March 15, 2011 however, there was a magnitude 6.2 earthquake at shallow depth a few kilometres from Mount Fuji on its southern side.

Recorded eruptions

About 11,000 years ago, a large amount of lava began to erupt from the west side of the top of the ancient Fuji mountain. This lava formed the new Fuji, which is the main body of Mount Fuji. Since then, the tops of the ancient Fuji and the new Fuji have been side by side. About 2,500–2,800 years ago, the top part of ancient Fuji was destroyed in a large sector collapse and only the top of Shin-Fuji remained.
Ten known eruptions can be traced to reliable records.

Current eruptive danger

Following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake, there was speculation in the media that the shock may induce volcanic unrest at Mount Fuji. In September 2012, mathematical models created by the National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention (NRIESDP) suggested that the pressure in Mount Fuji's magma chamber could be 1.6 megapascals higher than it was before its last eruption in 1707. This was interpreted by some media outlets to mean that an eruption of Mount Fuji could be imminent. Since there is no known method of directly measuring the pressure of a volcano's magma chamber however, indirect calculations of the type used by NRIESDP are speculative and unverifiable. Other indicators suggestive of heightened eruptive danger, such as active fumaroles and recently discovered faults, are typical occurrences at this type of volcano.

Eruption fears continued into the 2020s. In 2021, a new hazard map was created to help residents plan for evacuation, stoking fears because of its increased estimate of lava flow and additional vents. Soon afterwards, a 4.8 magnitude earthquake hit the area, sending the phrase "Mt Fuji eruption" trending on Twitter. The Japan Meteorological Agency however, assured the public the earthquake did not increase the eruption risk. In 2023, a new evacuation plan was developed to account for the 2021 hazard map update.

Aokigahara forest

The forest at the northwest base of the mountain is named Aokigahara. Folk tales and legends tell of ghosts, demons, yūrei and yōkai haunting the forest, and in the 19th century, Aokigahara was one of many places where poor families abandoned the very young and elderly. Approximately 30 suicides have been counted yearly, with a high of nearly 80 bodies in 2002. The recent increase in suicides prompted local officials to erect signs that attempt to convince individuals experiencing suicidal intent to re-think their desperate plans, and sometimes these messages have proven effective. The numbers of suicides in the past creates an allure that has persisted across the span of decades.

Many hikers mark their routes by leaving colored plastic tape behind as they pass, raising concern among prefectural officials about the forest's ecosystem.

Adventuring

Transportation

The closest airport with scheduled international service is Mt. Fuji Shizuoka Airport. It opened in June 2009. It is about from Mount Fuji. The major international airports serving Tokyo, Tokyo International Airport (Haneda Airport) in Tokyo and Narita International Airport in Chiba are approximately three hours and 15 minutes from Mount Fuji.

Climbing routes

Approximately 300,000 people climbed Mount Fuji in 2009. The most popular period for people to hike up Mount Fuji is from July to August, while huts and other facilities are operating and the weather is warmest. Buses to the trail heads typically used by climbers start running on July 1. Climbing from October to May is very strongly discouraged, after several high-profile deaths and severe cold weather. Most Japanese climb the mountain at night to be in a position at or near the summit when the sun rises. The morning light is called ''goraikō'', "arrival of light".

There are four major routes to the summit, each has numbered stations along the way. They are (clockwise, starting north): Kawaguchiko, Subashiri, Gotemba, and Fujinomiya routes. Climbers usually start at the fifth stations, as these are reachable by car or by bus. The summit is the tenth station on each trail. The stations on different routes are at different elevations; the highest fifth station is located at Fujinomiya, followed by Yoshida, Subashiri, and Gotemba. There are four additional routes from the foot of the mountain: Shojiko, Yoshida, Suyama, and Murayama routes.

Even though it has only the second-highest elevation, the Yoshida route is the most popular because of its large parking area and many large mountain huts where a climber can rest or stay. During the summer season, most Mount Fuji climbing tour buses arrive there. The next most popular is the Fujinomiya route, which has the highest fifth station, followed by Subashiri and Gotemba. The ascent from the new fifth station can take anywhere between five and seven hours, while the descent can take from three to four hours. Even though most climbers do not use the Subashiri and Gotemba routes, many descend these because of their ash-covered paths. From the seventh station to near the fifth station, one could run down these ash-covered paths in approximately 30 minutes.

There are also tractor routes along the climbing routes. These tractor routes are used to bring food and other materials to huts on the mountain. Because the tractors usually take up most of the width of these paths and they tend to push large rocks from the side of the path, the tractor paths are off-limits to the climbers on sections that are not merged with the climbing or descending paths. Nevertheless, one can sometimes see people riding mountain bikes along the tractor routes down from the summit. This is particularly risky, as it becomes difficult to control speed and may send some rocks rolling along the side of the path, which may hit other people.

The four routes from the foot of the mountain offer historical sites. The Murayama is the oldest route, and the Yoshida route still has many old shrines, teahouses, and huts along its path. These routes are gaining popularity recently and are being restored, but climbing from the foot of the mountain is still relatively uncommon. Bears that live on the mountain have been sighted along the Yoshida route.

Huts at and above the fifth stations are usually staffed during the climbing season, but huts below the fifth stations are not usually staffed for climbers. The number of open huts on routes is proportional to the number of climbers—Yoshida has the most, while Gotemba has the fewest. The huts along the Gotemba route also tend to start later and close earlier than those along the Yoshida route. Also, because Mount Fuji is designated as a national park, it is illegal to camp above the fifth station.

There are eight peaks around the crater at the summit. The highest point in Japan, Ken-ga-mine, is where the Mount Fuji Radar System used to be (it was replaced by an automated system on October 1, 2008). Climbers can visit each of these peaks.

Paragliding

Paragliders take off in the vicinity of the fifth station, Gotemba parking lot, between Subashiri and Hōei-zan peak on the south side of the mountain, in addition to several other locations, depending on wind direction. Several paragliding schools use the wide sandy/grassy slope between Gotemba and Subashiri parking lots as a training hill.

Overtourism concerns

On 1 February 2024, the Yamanashi prefectural government imposed a mandatory fee of 2,000 yen ($13) for hikers using the Yoshida trail beginning in the summer season as part of efforts to ease congestion and provide funding for safety protocols. It later announced that it would impose a daily limit of 4,000 hikers on the trail and close it between 4 p.m. and 3 a.m. except for guests in mountain lodges. The Shizuoka prefectural government subsequently announced that it would also close the Subashiri, Gotemba and Fujinomiya trails at the same time with the same exceptions, citing also concerns over congestion.

In culture

Shinto mythology

In Shinto mythology, Kuninotokotachi (国之常立神 ^?, ''Kuninotokotachi-no-Kami'', in ''Kojiki'') (国常立尊 ^?, ''Kuninotokotachi-no-Mikoto'', in ''Nihon Shoki'') is one of the two gods born from "something like a reed that arose from the soil" when the earth was chaotic. According to the ''Nihon Shoki'', Konohanasakuya-hime, wife of Ninigi, is the goddess of Mount Fuji, where Fujisan Hongū Sengen Taisha is dedicated to her.

In ancient times, the mountain was worshipped from afar. The Asama shrine was set up at the foothills to ward off eruptions. In the Heian period (794–1185), volcanic activity subsided and Fuji was used as a base for Shugendō, a syncretic religion combining mountain worship and Buddhism. Worshippers began to climb the slopes, and by the early 12th century, Matsudai Shonin had founded a temple on the summit.

Fuji-kō was an Edo period cult centred around the mountain founded by an ascetic named Hasegawa Kakugyō (1541–1646). The cult venerated the mountain as a female deity, and encouraged its members to climb it. In doing so, they would be reborn, "purified and... able to find happiness." The cult waned in the Meiji period, and although it persists to this day, it has been subsumed into Shintō sects.

Popular culture

As a national symbol of the country, the mountain has been depicted in various art media such as paintings, woodblock prints (such as Hokusai's '' Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji'' and '' 100 Views of Mount Fuji'' from the 1830s), poetry, music, theater, film, manga, anime, pottery and even Kawaii subculture.

Before its explosive eruption in 1980, Mount St. Helens was once known as "The Fuji of America", for its striking resemblance to Mount Fuji. Mount Taranaki in New Zealand is also said to bear a resemblance to Mount Fuji, and for this reason has been used as a stand-in for the mountain in films and television.

See also

* List of mountains and hills of Japan by height
* ''100 Famous Japanese Mountains''
* List of three-thousanders in Japan
* List of World Heritage sites in Japan
* List of elevation extremes by country
* , Araido Island (阿頼度島), Kuril Islands

Notes

References

*

External links

*

Fujisan (Mount Fuji)
– Smithsonian Institution: Global Volcanism Program

Comprehensive Database of Archaeological Site Reports in Japan
Nara National Research Institute for Cultural Properties

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Volcanoes of Honshū
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