Page 237 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide: Japan

JAP AN REGION B Y REGION  235

KYUSHU

Long regarded as a backwater by the rest of Japan, the island of Kyushu’s
history of interaction with China, Southeast Asia, and Europe has, in fact,
made it one of Japan’s most cosmopolitan and culturally progressive regions.
Such diversity creates the sensa tion, as you journey from prehistoric sites to
urban centers such as the main city of Fukuoka, of traveling through a
microcosm of Japan.

Organized communities settled in Holland. Later, dur ing the two centuries
Kyushu in the Jomon period (14,500– of Japan’s self-imposed isola tion, the tiny
300 BC). Ac cording to legend, it was from island of Dejima off the coast of Nagasaki
Kyushu that the first emperor of Japan, was the country’s sole entrepôt for
Jimmu, set out on his campaign to unify Western trade and learning.
the country in the 6th century BC. And it The island landscape is characterized
was through Kyushu in the 4th century by volcanic activ ity. Kagoshima lies in
AD that Chinese and Korean culture, the shadow of Sakurajima, which daily
includ ing Buddhism and the Chinese belches ash; Mount Aso is one of the
writ ing system, first infiltrated Japan. Not world’s largest calderas; and steaming
all foreign incursions were welcomed, fissures and fumeroles are found at
however. The natives of the island Beppu, Unzen, and other spa towns.
repelled several Mongolian invasions, Kyushu is one of the world’s fore most
the last and most formidable in 1274 ceramic centers. Pottery and porcelain
only by the intervention of a power ful techniques, learned from craftsmen
storm, the kamikaze (divine wind), which brought from Korea, were perfected
scuttled the Mongolian fleet. at the workshops and kilns of Arita,
In the 16th century, Christianity, Imari, and Karatsu.
firearms, and medicine were intro duced The island offers the visitor a rich
through the port cities of Nagasaki concentration of sights, ranging from
and Kumamoto by the mer chants and feudal castle towns and Shinto moun tain
emissaries of Portugal, Spain, and shrines to hi-tech museums.

Buddhist figures carved into the cliffs at Usuki
Exquisitely decorated room in Honmaru Goten Palace, Kumamoto Castle

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