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78-888: Most scholars believe that Japonic was brought to the Japanese archipelago from the Korean peninsula with the Yayoi culture during the 1st millennium BC. There is some fragmentary evidence suggesting that Japonic languages may still have been spoken in central and southern parts of the Korean peninsula (see Peninsular Japonic ) in the early centuries AD. Possible genetic relationships with many other language families have been proposed, most systematically with Koreanic , but no genetic relationship has been conclusively demonstrated. The extant Japonic languages belong to two well-defined branches: Japanese and Ryukyuan. Most scholars believe that Japonic

156-665: A Korean form, and the other is also found in Ryukyuan and Eastern Old Japanese, suggesting that the former is an early loan from Korean. He suggests that to eliminate such early loans, Old Japanese morphemes should not be assigned a Japonic origin unless they are also attested in Southern Ryukyuan or Eastern Old Japanese. That procedure leaves fewer than a dozen possible cognates, which may have been borrowed by Korean from Peninsular Japonic. Most Japonic languages have voicing opposition for obstruents , with exceptions such as

234-528: A Southwestern branch. Kyushu and Ryukyuan varieties also share some lexical items, some of which appear to be innovations. The internal classification by Elisabeth de Boer includes Ryukyuan as a deep subbranch of a Kyūshū–Ryūkyū branch: She also proposes a branch consisting of the Izumo dialect (spoken on the northern coast of western Honshu) and the Tōhoku dialects (northern Honshu), which show similar developments in

312-508: A basic subject–object–verb word order, modifiers before nouns, and postpositions . There is a clear distinction between verbs, which have extensive inflectional morphology, and nominals, with agglutinative suffixing morphology. Ryukyuan languages inflect all adjectives in the same way as verbs, while mainland varieties have classes of adjectives that inflect as nouns and verbs respectively. Most Japonic languages mark singular and plural number , but some Northern Ryukyuan languages also have

390-400: A combination of internal reconstruction from Old Japanese and by applying the comparative method to Old Japanese (including eastern dialects) and Ryukyuan. The major reconstructions of the 20th century were produced by Samuel Elmo Martin and Shirō Hattori . Proto-Japonic words are generally polysyllabic, with syllables having the form (C)V. The following proto-Japonic consonant inventory

468-669: A series of short-reigning kings, warfare, and succession disputes, Shō Shin conquered much of the Ryukyu Islands and organized a centralized kingdom at Shuri gusuku , ending the Gusuku period and ushering in the Ryukyu Kingdom . The Ryukyu Islands are an island chain on the eastern rim of the East China Sea , adjacent to Taiwan in the southwest and Kyushu to the northeast. Intermittent human settlement of

546-430: A simple (C)V syllable structure and avoiding vowel sequences. The script also distinguished eight vowels (or diphthongs), with two each corresponding to modern i , e and o . Most of the texts reflect the speech of the area around Nara , the eighth-century Japanese capital, but over 300 poems were written in eastern dialects of Old Japanese . The language experienced a massive influx of Sino-Japanese vocabulary after

624-641: A single enclosure, while much larger gusuku ranging from 1–2 ha (2–5 acres) have multiple. Even larger castles exceeding 2 ha (5 acres) emerged after the end of the Gusuku period. Gusuku on Amami were built for mountain defense, and feature smaller enclosures and large ditches. They were built on "virtually every ridge and headland", protecting rivers and bays, often in direct line-of-sight of one another. Smaller enclosed fortifications were constructed in Sakishima, although some examples of stone-walled gusuku are attested. A class of local nobility,

702-438: A small population of elderly speakers. The Ryukyuan languages were originally and traditionally spoken throughout the Ryukyu Islands , an island arc stretching between the southern Japanese island of Kyushu and the island of Taiwan . Most of them are considered "definitely" or "critically endangered" because of the spread of mainland Japanese. Since Old Japanese displayed several innovations that are not shared with Ryukyuan,

780-507: Is a compilation of Ryukyuan chants or songs, comprising 22 volumes and 1,553 songs, with the earliest volumes compiled during the early 1530s. Difficult to decipher and understand, the Omoro at times disagrees with the official histories. However, both are biased towards Shō Shin, the Shuri area, and Okinawa in general. The official histories state that a sage king of divine ancestry, Tenson ,

858-544: Is an era of the history of the Ryukyu Islands corresponding to the spread of agriculture and Japonic culture from Japan alongside increased social organization, eventually leading to endemic warfare and the construction of the namesake gusuku fortresses. Following the Shellmidden period , the Gusuku is generally described as beginning in the 11th century , following a dramatic social and economic shift over

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936-553: Is attested in southern Okinawa. In the north of the island, where coral limestone was not available, ditches dug across ridges were used as fortifications. Many of the larger gususku were built by slaves taken during pirate raids and used Japanese and Korean-style roofing tiles likely built by foreign tilesmiths who settled in the islands. While many gusuku were permanent installations, some were occupied only during emergencies. Gusuku dramatically vary in size. Smaller structures measuring less than 2,000 m (0.5 acres) feature

1014-415: Is based on a subsyllabic unit, the mora . Each syllable has a basic mora of the form (C)V but a nasal coda , geminate consonant , or lengthened vowel counts as an additional mora. However, some dialects in northern Honshu or southern Kyushu have syllable-based rhythm. Like Ainu, Middle Korean , and some modern Korean dialects , most Japonic varieties have a lexical pitch accent , which governs whether

1092-477: Is fragmentary evidence suggesting that now-extinct Japonic languages were spoken in the central and southern parts of the Korean peninsula. Vovin calls these languages Peninsular Japonic and groups Japanese and Ryukyuan as Insular Japonic  [ fr ] . The most-cited evidence comes from chapter 37 of the Samguk sagi (compiled in 1145), which contains a list of pronunciations and meanings of placenames in

1170-546: Is generally accepted that a lexical pitch accent should be reconstructed for Proto-Japonic, but its precise form is controversial. Japanese archipelago The Japanese archipelago ( Japanese : 日本列島 , Nihon Rettō ) is an archipelago of 14,125 islands that form the country of Japan . It extends over 3,000 km (1,900 mi) from the Sea of Okhotsk in the northeast to the East China and Philippine seas in

1248-603: Is generally agreed upon, except that some scholars argue for voiced stops *b and *d instead of glides *w and *j : The Old Japanese voiced consonants b , d , z and g , which never occurred word-initially, are derived from clusters of nasals and voiceless consonants after the loss of an intervening vowel. Most authors accept six Proto-Japonic vowels: Some authors also propose a high central vowel *ɨ . The mid vowels *e and *o were raised to Old Japanese i and u respectively, except word-finally. Other Old Japanese vowels arose from sequences of Proto-Japonic vowels. It

1326-502: The aji , began to emerge during the early Gusuku period. Local aji initially constructed small gusuku as a show of political power. As particular aji consolidated holdings and absorbed the territories of neighboring lords, the fortifications steadily grew in size and complexity. The most powerful nobles were referred to as aji-osoi ("leader of lords"). They commanded local armies, and held control over less powerful aji within their territories. Larger polities shared power between

1404-459: The Ryukyu Islands . There is fragmentary placename evidence that now-extinct Japonic languages were still spoken in central and southern parts of the Korean peninsula several centuries later. Japanese is the de facto national language of Japan , where it is spoken by about 126 million people. The oldest attestation is Old Japanese , which was recorded using Chinese characters in the 7th and 8th centuries. It differed from Modern Japanese in having

1482-639: The Southern Court during the Nanboku-chō period , with major bases on Kyushu and Tsushima . Following the collapse of the Southern Court in the 1380s and 1390s, Kyushu wokou migrated to the Ryukyus, outside of the reach of the victorious Ashikaga shogunate . Naha (on Okinawa) served as the primary port of call in the Ryukyus and became a major center of piracy and slave trading during

1560-411: The dual . Most Ryukyuan languages mark a clusivity distinction in plural (or dual) first-person pronouns, but no Mainland varieties do so. The most common type of morphosyntactic alignment is nominative–accusative , but neutral (or direct), active–stative and (very rarely) tripartite alignment are found in some Japonic languages. The proto-language of the family has been reconstructed by using

1638-579: The Ōsumi Islands largely follow corresponding archaeological periods in Japan, adopting rice and millet cultivation during the Middle Yayoi period . Beginning around 300 BCE, the Shellmidden population saw a steady decline from its peak. Populations remained low across the 1st millennium CE. The islanders traded with Japan, but saw little cultural influence from it beyond pottery designs. During

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1716-485: The 1950s, was among the first historians to identify a major discontinuity in Ryukyuan history during what would come to be known as the Gusuku period. Highly skeptical of the official histories, he described the rise of aji, warrior culture, migrations from Japan, and endemic warfare in the twelfth century. Nakahara wrote that Shō Hashi and the First Shō Dynasty ruled Okinawa in name only and that true unification and

1794-448: The 7th century. However, Sino-Japanese vocabulary borrowed from Early Middle Japanese indicates that it maintained close contact with Japanese until the 8th or 9th century. This divergence before the Gusuku period suggests a Pre-Proto-Ryukyuan homeland in southern Kyushu and the surrounding islands. Proto-Ryukyuan itself branched off from this earlier form in the archipelago, possibly on Kikaijima, where it diversified as it spread across

1872-670: The 9th century, the Dazaifu (the regional Japanese government of Kyushu) established the Gusuku site on Kikaijima as a trading outpost. Exploiting the lucrative trade of turbo sea snail shells (a source of mother of pearl highly prized by artisans), Kikaijima became a major trading hub closely tied to the Japanese port of Hakata and the Korean Goryeo ; a small community of merchants from Goryeo settled on Kikaijima, leading to

1950-621: The First Shō dynasty may not have been linked as a bloodline or family. The southern Ryukyu Islands were under a series of local warlords, with trade relations to Shuri and the Shō dynasty. In 1453, Shō Taikyū emerged as the ruler of Shuri. Before his death in 1460, he conquered Katsuren gusuku , minted coins in his name, and took full control of trade with Korea. He launched military expeditions to Amami and Kikaijima, but failed to achieve full political hegemony over Okinawa. His son Shō Toku took

2028-447: The Gusuku period, beginning c.  1200 CE and stretching well into the early Ryukyu Kingdom . However, following increasing archaeological evidence for subsistence agriculture and greater social complexity in the centuries prior, contemporary sources have largely redefined the period as lasting from c.  1050 to c.  1429 , corresponding to the period of increased trade, societal shifts, and endemic warfare before

2106-529: The Ming commencing in 1372; the establishment of formal tribute status during this period resulted in a much greater volume of trade. Diplomatic relationships with the Ashikaga shogunate may have been opened by the lord of Shuri in 1403. The Ryukyus were major bases of pirate activity from the late 13th century onward to the end of the Gusuku period. Many of these pirates, known as wokou , were aligned with

2184-737: The Miyako dialect of Ōgami. Glottalized consonants are common in North Ryukyuan languages but are rarer in South Ryukyuan. Proto-Japonic had only voiceless obstruents, like Ainu and proto- Korean . Japonic languages also resemble Ainu and modern Korean in having a single liquid consonant phoneme. A five-vowel system like Standard Japanese /a/ , /i/ , /u/ , /e/ and /o/ is common, but some Ryukyuan languages also have central vowels /ə/ and /ɨ/ , and Yonaguni has only /a/ , /i/ , and /u/ . In most Japonic languages, speech rhythm

2262-537: The Ryukyu Islands prior to the Gusuku migrations was of Jōmon ancestry, with little of the Yayoi genetics prevalent in mainland Japan. Interactions between this population and the Japonic newcomers varied across the archipelago. However, many Japonic communities formed cultural enclaves, evidenced by both material cultures coexisting for several centuries. In other cases, Japonic settlements emerged with practically no indigenous influence whatsoever. Indigenous culture on

2340-625: The Shellmidden transitioned into the Gusuku. Agriculture likely took root in the Amami Islands in the 8th century, before spreading to the Okinawa Islands 100–200 years later. Rice and millet agriculture spread to Sakishima by the 12th century. Cereal crops such as rice , barley , wheat , and foxtail millet have been found in Gusuku sites, alongside possibly beans . Southern Okinawa sites mainly grew millet and barley, while rice predominated in northern Okinawa and Amami. This rice

2418-509: The Tokyo dialect has several western features not found in other eastern dialects. The Hachijō language , spoken on Hachijō-jima and the Daitō Islands , including Aogashima , is highly divergent and varied. It has a mix of conservative features inherited from Eastern Old Japanese and influences from modern Japanese, making it difficult to classify. Hachijō is an endangered language , with

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2496-527: The aid of Chinese officials. He was a powerful military leader, although probably lacked political control over all of Okinawa. The various other kings of Chūzan followed him as the sole tribute king of Okinawa, forming the First Shō dynasty at the Shuri gusuku . After his death, the kingdom went through a rapid series of rulers of only a few years each, often marked by succession crises and wars. The kings of

2574-479: The archipelago from Japan's colonies and other territories. The archipelago consists of 14,125 islands (here defined as land more than 100 m in circumference), of which 430 are inhabited. The five main islands, from north to south, are Hokkaido , Honshu , Shikoku , Kyushu , and Okinawa . Honshu is the largest and referred to as the Japanese mainland . The topography is divided as: Gusuku culture The Gusuku period ( グスク時代 , Gusuku jidai )

2652-517: The archipelago, especially on Okinawa and Amami . By the 14th century, three kingdoms (the Sanzan) emerged as tributary kingdoms; these may have been confederations of aji , or simply prestige labels under which they operated in the Chinese tribute system . In 1429, Shō Hashi emerged as the sole tribute king of Okinawa, although he likely failed to achieve political hegemony over the island. After

2730-530: The archipelago. Earlier, now-discredited, theories attribute the emergence of Proto-Ryukyuan to either the Hayato people , speakers of a divergent Japonic language, settling the Ryukyus after the conquest of southern Kyushu by the expanding Yamato state , or as an evolution from a trade creole on Kikaijima. Large-scale cultivation as the primary means of subsistence in the Central Ryukyus began as

2808-744: The archipelago. These migrations, while all originating on Kikaijima, spread progressively southward; the Amami Islands were the first to be fully settled, followed by the Okinawa Islands , the Miyako Islands , and finally the Yaeyama Islands . This migration was likely motivated by access to various trade goods found in the southern islands, highly coveted in Song China and by the Heian aristocracy. The indigenous population of

2886-709: The beginning of the Common Era , cereal cultivation did not occur in the Ryuykus before c.  800 CE , with plant foods largely limited to nuts. Cultivation of taro or other root crops has been theorized, although without conclusive archaeological evidence. The lone unambiguous cultigens from the Shellmidden are bottle gourd seeds recovered from the Okinawan Ireibaru site. While various theories positing significant pre-Gusuku cereal agriculture have been proposed, such developments would require

2964-423: The central "Kunigami" branch comprising varieties from Southern Amami to Northern Okinawan, based on similar vowel systems and patterns of lenition of stops. Pellard suggests a binary division based on shared innovations, with an Amami group including the varieties from Kikai to Yoron, and an Okinawa group comprising the varieties of Okinawa and smaller islands to its west. Southern Ryukyuan languages are spoken in

3042-696: The centralization of the Kingdom of Chūzan and the unification of the Ryukyu Kingdom. Within the Yaeyama Islands (or Sakishima more generally), the period corresponding to the Gusuku is sometimes described as part of the Suku period, divided between the Shinzato Mura (12th–13th centuries) and the Nakamori Period (13th–17th centuries). Due to their proximity and trade links to Kyushu,

3120-554: The creation of the Kamuiyaki stoneware with cultural influence from Korean ceramics. The Gusuku site became a polity encompassing Kikaijima and the Kasari peninsula of neighboring Amami , which was itself becoming an early center of agriculture in the region. Beginning in the 11th century, large numbers of agrarian Japonic -speaking peoples settled the Ryukyus, with Kikaijima as the origin of various successive migration waves across

3198-552: The emergence of a mature feudal society emerged under the Second Shō. Other contemporary historians, such as Inamura Kenpu and Higa Shunchō , also identified the Gusuku period, viewing it as a social and political transformation of an existing Japonic culture in Ryukyu analogous to Japan's earlier development. The centrality of Japan to development in the Ryukyus was challenged in the 1980s and 1990s as Okinawa's domestic development

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3276-646: The end of the period; it was initially compiled by Chinese merchants and trade officials in Okinawa. An inscription on the Bankoku Shinryō no Kane (lit. ''Sea Bridge to the Many Countries Bell'') dates to 1458. The first official or state history of Ryukyu, the Chūzan Seikan (lit. Reflections on Chūzan ) was published by Shō Shōken in 1650, long after the end of the Gusuku period, and

3354-411: The export of sulfur and turbo snail shells . A unique vernacular architecture emerged in the region, featuring elevated village houses, initially defended by palisades. The rise of the local aji nobility steadily led to the expansion of fortifications, eventually leading to the construction of the namesake gusuku . These developed into massive stone fortresses, which were built in great numbers across

3432-467: The former kingdom of Goguryeo . As the pronunciations are given using Chinese characters , they are difficult to interpret, but several of those from central Korea, in the area south of the Han River captured from Baekje in the 5th century, seem to correspond to Japonic words. Scholars differ on whether they represent the language of Goguryeo or the people that it conquered. Traces from the south of

3510-429: The house were typically spaced by a bay ( ken ) of roughly 1 metre (3.3 ft), significantly smaller than the ken spacings used in traditional Japanese architecture. Houses contained hearths , with the largest having two. Elevated storehouses (termed takakura ) were positioned 10–15 meters (30–50 ft) from the main structures, generally to the southwest to maximize sunlight. Some of these village sites include

3588-415: The introduction of Buddhism in the 6th century and peaking with the wholesale importation of Chinese culture in the 8th and the 9th centuries. The loanwords now account for about half the lexicon. They also affected the sound system of the language by adding compound vowels, syllable-final nasals, and geminate consonants, which became separate morae . Most of the changes in morphology and syntax reflected in

3666-416: The island, and instead been labels that various powerful aji operated under during trade and tribute relations with the Ming. By 1429, Okinawa's tribute relations with the Ming became the domain of a single ruler, Shō Hashi . Hashi, the son of Shō Shishō of Chūzan and possibly the grandson of a Southern Court wokou from Higo Province , came to power with the defeat of Bunei of Chūzan, likely due to

3744-490: The islands gradually assimilated, vanishing entirely by the 14th century. Due to their shared set of innovations absent in Japanese , the modern Ryukyuan languages are generally thought to form one of the two or three main branches of Japonic, and descend from a common Proto-Ryukyuan origin. They retain archaic features from Proto-Japonic that were lost in Old Japanese , suggesting a divergence date no later than

3822-605: The land bridge that would later become the Ryukyus began in the Late Pleistocene , c.  32,000 years ago . Hunter-gatherer groups originating from neighboring Kyushu began to populate the northern and central Ryukyus c.  5000 BCE , although recent sites suggest possible initial dates of c.  7000 or c.  12,000 BCE. This repopulation began the Shellmound or Shellmidden period . Complex hunter-gatherer societies emerged during

3900-724: The last elements of Gusuku period local governance. Extremely few written documents date to the Gusuku period, with primary sources limited to foreign diplomatic and tribute records during the latest portion of the period, such as the Ming Veritable Records and the Veritable Records of the Joseon Dynasty . A compilation of diplomatic and trade records, the Rekidai Hōan (lit. ''Precious Documents of Successive Generations''), began in 1424, around

3978-552: The late Gusuku period. Both contemporary Ming dynasty tribute records and later Ryukyuan official histories state that Okinawa was divided into three kingdoms, collectively termed the Sanzan , during the 14th and early 15th centuries: Sanhoku in the north, Chūzan in the center, and Sannan in the south. These polities may have functioned as loose confederations of aji , with their kings as confederation leaders. Alternatively, they may not have corresponded to territorial control on

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4056-578: The main Japanese islands. By the 13th century, imports shifted to Longquan celadon , with smaller amounts of Korean, Thai, and Vietnamese ceramics. In addition to the Japanese and Goryeo traders at Kikaijima, traders from the Song Empire became active in the Ryukyu Islands during the Gusuku period. Sulfur mined at Iōjima was likely exported to China via Japan. During the late 14th century, tribute missions were sent by Okinawan aji to Ming China and Joseon Korea , with formal tribute relations with

4134-507: The mid-Shellmidden, but polities such as chiefdoms did not emerge. This is attributed to low populations and carrying capacity before the introduction of intensive agriculture. The Shellmidden people exploited plentiful shellfish and reef fish populations. They also hunted the Ryukyu wild boar , the largest mammals on the islands, and possibly tended to domestic pigs . Although other East Asian populations adopted agriculture long before

4212-505: The modern language took place during the Late Middle Japanese period (13th to 16th centuries). Modern mainland Japanese dialects , spoken on Honshu , Kyushu , Shikoku , and Hokkaido , are generally grouped as follows: The early capitals of Nara and Kyoto lay within the western area, and their Kansai dialect retained its prestige and influence long after the capital was moved to Edo (modern Tokyo) in 1603. Indeed,

4290-444: The moras of a word are pronounced high or low, but it follows widely-different patterns. In Tokyo-type systems, the basic pitch of a word is high, with an accent (if present) marking the position of a drop to low pitch. In Kyushu dialects, the basic pitch is low, with accented syllables given high pitch. In Kyoto-type systems, both types are used. Japonic languages, again like Ainu and Korean, are left-branching (or head-final ), with

4368-577: The northern part of the chain, including the major Amami and Okinawa Islands . They form a single dialect continuum , with mutual unintelligibility between widely separated varieties. The major varieties are, from northeast to southwest: There is no agreement on the subgrouping of the varieties. One proposal, adopted by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger , has three subgroups, with

4446-658: The peninsula are very sparse: According to Shirō Hattori , more attempts have been made to link Japanese with other language families than for any other language. None of the attempts has succeeded in demonstrating a common descent for Japonic and any other language family. The most systematic comparisons have involved Korean , which has a very similar grammatical structure to Japonic languages. Samuel Elmo Martin , John Whitman, and others have proposed hundreds of possible cognates, with sound correspondences. However, Alexander Vovin points out that Old Japanese contains several pairs of words of similar meaning in which one word matches

4524-526: The pitch accent that she attributes to sea-borne contacts. Another alternative classification, proposed by the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology as part of their Glottolog project, splits the Hachijō language into an independent branch of Japonic, in addition to splitting the divergent Kagoshima and Tsugaru dialects into independent branches of a "Japanesic" family. There

4602-505: The previous centuries. The Shellmidden-Gusuku transition has been linked to Japonic-speaking migrants and influence from the Dazaifu trade outpost on Kikaijima , leading to the emergence of the Proto-Ryukyuan language . The period saw extensive agriculture in the archipelago, including the cultivation of foxtail millet , rice, barley, and wheat. Trade occurred with China, Korea, and Japan, including imports of foreign ceramics and

4680-506: The relocation of trading infrastructure to Okinawa after the 1188 invasion of Kikaijima. His depiction may have been inspired by the legendary Chinese Emperor Shun . Eiso is described as displacing Shunten's dynasty and ruling from 1260 to 1299. He is the earliest named ruler to appear in the Omoro . Although traditionally depicted as the king of a unified Okinawa, he was likely a regional warlord in Urasoe. Zenchū Nakahara , writing in

4758-494: The remains of metalworking facilities, including pits for the storage of ironsand and hearths equipped with clay tuyeres . In the 13th century, villages were increasingly built in defensive positions during and surrounded by palisades . By the later portion of the century, some settlements were partially encircled by stone walls . These early fortifications enclosed residential areas of both commoners and elites, as well as some utaki shrines, with satellite villages outside

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4836-555: The ruler and various councilors. Although trade links (mainly of shells) between Kyushu and the central Ryukyus date to the Yayoi, the transition into the Gusuku period saw the import of Chinese ceramics and Japanese soapstone cauldrons, used alongside native earthenware . The Gusuku people also imported iron knives and magatama from Japan. By the late 12th century, they began importing ceramics (such as Qingbai ware and celadon ) directly from China, including types not found in

4914-526: The southern part of the chain, the Sakishima Islands . They comprise three distinct dialect continua: The southern Ryukyus were settled by Japonic-speakers from the northern Ryukyus in the 13th century, leaving no linguistic trace of the indigenous inhabitants of the islands. An alternative classification, based mainly on the development of the pitch accent , groups the highly divergent Kagoshima dialects of southwestern Kyushu with Ryukyuan in

4992-994: The southwest along the Pacific coast of the Eurasian continent, and consists of three island arcs from north to south: the Northeastern Japan Arc , the Southwestern Japan Arc, and the Ryukyu Island Arc . The Daitō Islands , the Izu–Bonin–Mariana Arc , the Kuril Islands , and the Nanpō Islands neighbor the archipelago . Japan is the largest island country in East Asia and the fourth-largest island country in

5070-508: The throne after his death, beginning an eight-year rule described by the Ryukyuan official histories as despotic. A coup d'état by Shō En in 1470 founded the Second Shō dynasty . The reign of his son Shō Shin (1477 – 1526) saw the centralization of the Ryukyu Kingdom at Shuri gusuku and the final subjugation of outlying islands such as the Yaeyama . Local aji were forced to live at Shuri, with agents titled aji-uttchi assigned to administrate their holdings in their place, destroying

5148-403: The two branches must have separated before the 7th century. The move from Kyushu to the Ryukyus may have occurred later and possibly coincided with the rapid expansion of the agricultural Gusuku culture in the 10th and 11th centuries. Such a date would explain the presence in Proto-Ryukyuan of Sino-Japanese vocabulary borrowed from Early Middle Japanese . After the migration to the Ryukyus, there

5226-399: The unlikely abandonment of agriculture instead of foraging. The first signs of agriculture in the region date to the Late Shellmidden, evidenced by flotation samples dating to the 800s. However, cultivation remained relatively limited until a rapid expansion in the tenth to twelfth centuries, corresponding to a steady increase of migrants from Japan. Older sources use a later definition of

5304-412: The vast majority of finds, alongside smaller numbers of Adzuki beans and broomcorn millet . The centrality of agriculture to Gusuku period society is a topic of academic contention. Historians have generally analyzed the Gusuku as a stratified agrarian society, attributing the growth of a nobility and state polities to this agricultural base. Others have disputed this, suggesting that local agriculture

5382-512: The walls. During the 14th and 15th centuries, these fortifications evolved into the gusuku , with the largest taking the form of massive stone fortresses enclosing elite residences, shrines, and work areas oriented around a central plaza . By the 15th century, there were approximately 100 gusuku on Okinawa. Stone-walled gusuku , found on Okinawa, Yoron , and Okinoerabu , were likely inspired by Korean mountain fortresses. Many were built with coral limestone , although earthen construction

5460-455: The world with 377,975.24 km (145,937.06 sq mi). It has an exclusive economic zone of 4,470,000 km (1,730,000 sq mi). The term " Mainland Japan " is used to distinguish the large islands of the Japanese archipelago from the remote, smaller islands; it refers to the main islands of Hokkaido , Honshu , Kyushu , and Shikoku . From 1943 until the end of the Pacific War , Karafuto Prefecture (south Sakhalin )

5538-457: Was brought to northern Kyushu from the Korean peninsula around 700 to 300 BC by wet-rice farmers of the Yayoi culture and spread throughout the Japanese archipelago , replacing indigenous languages. The former wider distribution of Ainu languages is confirmed by placenames in northern Honshu ending in -betsu (from Ainu pet 'river') and -nai (from Ainu nai 'stream'). Somewhat later, Japonic languages also spread southward to

5616-413: Was designated part of the mainland. Geographically speaking the term "mainland" is somewhat inaccurate, as this refers to an expanse of territory that is attached to a continental landmass. The term "home islands" was used at the end of World War II to define the area where Japanese sovereignty and constitutional rule of its emperor would be restricted. The term is also commonly used today to distinguish

5694-485: Was emphasized, with historians such as Takara Kurayoshi and Murai Shōsuke emphasizing the independent emergence of a complex political order on Okinawa from agricultural surplus during the Gusuku period, often placing more credence into the official histories. This has been challenged by other historians who emphasize the importance of trade, with the Gusuku period representing a sudden and dramatic break from earlier periods, as large-scale migrations of Japonic peoples early in

5772-529: Was initially japonica rice , but tropical O. sativa was likely introduced later via trade with China and Southeast Asia . Farms were initially in low-lying alluvial regions, but gradually shifted to higher slopes. Wheat and barley were largely grown through dryfield cultivation , with irrigation largely limited to rice paddies . Cattle were used to cultivate both varieties of field. Archaeological examinations of sites at Miyako-jima have revealed similar crops to Okinawa and Amami. Foxtail millet composes

5850-510: Was limited influence from mainland Japan until the conquest of the Ryukyu Kingdom by the Satsuma Domain in 1609. Ryukyuan varieties are considered dialects of Japanese in Japan but have little intelligibility with Japanese or even among one another. They are divided into northern and southern groups, corresponding to the physical division of the chain by the 250 km-wide Miyako Strait . Northern Ryukyuan languages are spoken in

5928-480: Was mainly based on interviews with elderly officials. Later state histories include the two early-18th century versions of the Genealogy of Chūzan and the mid-18th century Kyūyō (lit. ''Beautiful Ryukyu''). Largely based on Confucian historiography and principles, it is not possible to corroborate most information from the official sources dating to periods before the 16th and 17th centuries. The Omoro sōshi

6006-461: Was the first king of Okinawa, and began the 17,000–year rule of the Tenson dynasty. In 1187, Shunten , the son of the exiled samurai Minamoto no Tametomo , defeated the usurper Riyū around 1187 and began his own dynasty. A severe lack of written documentation before the 17th century limits the understanding of state and religion during the period. Shunten was almost certainly fictional, but may reflect

6084-446: Was unlikely to produce a significant surplus, and instead attributing these developments to maritime trade. Shellmidden-era construction was largely limited to pit-houses . The agrarian settlements of the Gusuku saw a flourishing of vernacular architecture . Settlements during the 11th to 13th centuries typically comprised several elevated main houses raised on posts with diameters of 50 centimeters (1.6 ft) or more. Pillars within

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