page_title: Mutsu Province
section_title: After the Boshin War
hierarchical_section_title: Mutsu Province / History / After the Boshin War
context_page_description: Mutsu Province was an old province of Japan in the area of Fukushima, Miyagi, Iwate and Aomori Prefectures and the municipalities of Kazuno and Kosaka in Akita Prefecture.
  Mutsu Province is also known as Ōshū or Michinoku. The term Ōu is often used to refer to the combined area of Mutsu and the neighboring province Dewa, which together make up the entire Tōhoku region.
context_section_description: As a result of the Boshin War, Mutsu Province was divided by the Meiji government, on 19 January 1869, into five provinces: Iwashiro, Iwaki, Rikuzen, Rikuchū, and Rikuō). The fifth of these, corresponding roughly to today's Aomori Prefecture, was assigned the same two kanji as the entire province prior to division; however, the character reading was different. Due to the similarity in characters in the name, this smaller province has also sometimes been referred to as 'Mutsu'.
caption: Rikuō (Mutsu) Province from 1869 to 1871