Nagasaki

Nagasaki(Japanese:長崎,Hepburn:Nagasaki)(IPA:[naɡaꜜsaki];lit."Long Cape"), officiallyNagasaki City(長崎市,Nagasaki-shi), is the capital and the largestcityofNagasaki Prefectureon the island ofKyushuinJapan.
Founded by the Portuguese,the port ofNagasakibecame the soleport used for trade with the Portuguese and Dutchduring the 16th through 19th centuries. TheHidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Regionhave been recognized and included in theUNESCO World Heritage List. Part of Nagasaki was home to a majorImperial Japanese Navybase during theFirst Sino-Japanese WarandRusso-Japanese War. Near the end ofWorld War II, the Americanatomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasakimade Nagasaki the second city in the world to experience a nuclear attack. The city was rebuilt.
As of February 1, 2024, Nagasaki has an estimated population of 392,281,and a population density of 966 people per km. The total area is 405.86 km(156.70 sq mi).
The first contact withPortuguese explorersoccurred in 1543. An early visitor was supposedlyFernão Mendes Pinto, who came fromSagreson a Portuguese ship which landed nearby inTanegashima.
Soon after,Portuguese ships started sailing to Japan as regular trade freighters, thus increasing the contact and trade relations between Japan and the rest of the world, and particularly withmainland China, with whom Japan had previously severed its commercial and political ties, mainly due to a number of incidents involvingwokoupiracy in theSouth China Sea, with the Portuguese now serving as intermediaries between the twoEast Asianneighbors.
Despite the mutual advantages derived from these trading contacts, which would soon be acknowledged by all parties involved, the lack of a proper seaport inKyūshūfor the purpose of harboring foreign ships posed a major problem for both merchants and the Kyushudaimyōs(feudal lords) who expected to collect great advantages from the trade with the Portuguese.
In the meantime,SpanishJesuit missionarySt. Francis Xavierarrived inKagoshima, South Kyūshū, in 1549. After a somewhat fruitful two-year sojourn in Japan, he left for China in 1552 but died soon afterwards.His followers who remained behind converted a number ofdaimyōs. The most notable among them wasŌmura Sumitada. In 1569, Ōmura granted a permit for the establishment of a port with the purpose of harboring Portuguese ships in Nagasaki, which was set up in 1571, under the supervision of theJesuit missionary Gaspar VilelaandPortugueseCaptain-MajorTristão Vaz de Veiga, with Ōmura's personal assistance.
The little harbor village quickly grew into a diverse port city,and Portuguese products imported through Nagasaki (such as tobacco, bread, textiles and a Portuguese sponge-cake calledcastellas) were assimilated into popular Japanese culture.Tempuraderived from a popular Portuguese recipe originally known aspeixinhos da horta, and takes its name from the Portuguese word, 'tempero,' seasoning, and refers to the tempora quadragesima, forty days of Lent during which eating meat was forbidden, another example of the enduring effects of this cultural exchange. The Portuguese also brought with them many goods from other Asian countries, such as China. The value of Portuguese exports from Nagasaki during the 16th century were estimated to ascend to over 1,000,000cruzados, reaching as many as 3,000,000 in 1637.
Due to the instability during theSengoku period, Sumitada and Jesuit leaderAlexandro Valignanoconceived a plan to pass administrative control over to theSociety of Jesusrather than see the Catholic city taken over by a non-Catholicdaimyō. Thus, for a brief period after 1580, the city of Nagasaki was a Jesuit colony, under their administrative and military control. It became a refuge for Christians escaping maltreatment in other regions of Japan.In 1587, however,Toyotomi Hideyoshi's campaign to unify the country arrived in Kyūshū. Concerned with the large Christian influence in Kyūshū, Hideyoshi ordered the expulsion of allmissionaries, and placed the city under his direct control. However, the expulsion order went largely unenforced, and the fact remained that most of Nagasaki's population remained openly practicingCatholic.
In 1596, the Spanish shipSan Felipewas wrecked off the coast ofShikoku, and Hideyoshi learned from its pilotthat the SpanishFranciscanswere the vanguard of anIberianinvasion of Japan. In response, Hideyoshi ordered thecrucifixionsof twenty-six Catholics in Nagasaki on February 5 of the next year (i.e. the "Twenty-six Martyrs of Japan"). Portuguese traders were not ostracized, however, and so the city continued to thrive.
In 1602,Augustinianmissionaries also arrived in Japan, and whenTokugawa Ieyasutook power in 1603, Catholicism was still tolerated. Many Catholicdaimyōshad been critical allies at theBattle of Sekigahara, and the Tokugawa position was not strong enough to move against them. OnceOsaka Castlehad been taken andToyotomi Hideyoshi's offspring killed, though, the Tokugawa dominance was assured. In addition, the Dutch and English presence allowed trade without religious strings attached. Thus, in 1614,Catholicismwas officially banned and all missionaries ordered to leave. Most Catholic daimyoapostatized, and forced their subjects to do so, although a few would not renounce the religion and left the country forMacau,LuzonandJapantownsin Southeast Asia. A brutal campaign of persecution followed, with thousands of converts across Kyūshū and other parts of Japan killed, tortured, or forced to renounce their religion. Many Japanese and foreign Christians were executed by publiccrucifixionandburning at the stakein Nagasaki.They became known as theMartyrs of Japanand were later venerated by severalPopes.
Catholicism's last gasp as an open religion and the last major military action in Japan until theMeiji Restorationwas theShimabara Rebellionof 1637. While there is no evidence that Europeans directly incited the rebellion,Shimabara Domainhad been a Christianhanfor several decades, and the rebels adopted many Portuguese motifs and Christianicons. Consequently, in Tokugawa society the word "Shimabara" solidified the connection between Christianity and disloyalty, constantly used again and again in Tokugawa propaganda.The Shimabara Rebellion also convinced many policy-makers that foreign influences were more trouble than they were worth, leading to thenational isolation policy. The Portuguese were expelled from the archipelago altogether. They had previously been living on a specially constructedartificial islandin Nagasaki harbour that served as atrading post, calledDejima. The Dutch were then moved from their base atHiradoonto the artificial island.
TheGreat Fire of Nagasakidestroyed much of the city in 1663, including theMazushrine at theKofuku Templepatronized by the Chinese sailors and merchants visiting the port.
In 1720, the ban on Dutch books was lifted, causing hundreds of scholars to flood into Nagasaki to study European science and art. Consequently, Nagasaki became a major center of what was calledrangaku, or "Dutch learning". During theEdo period, theTokugawa shogunategoverned the city, appointing ahatamoto, theNagasaki bugyō, as its chief administrator. During this period, Nagasaki was designated a "shogunal city". The number of such cities rose from three to eleven under the Tokugawa administration.
Consensus among historians was once that Nagasaki was Japan's only window on the world during its time as a closed country in the Tokugawa era. However, nowadays, it is generally accepted that this was not the case, since Japan interacted and traded with theRyūkyū Kingdom,Koreaand Russia throughSatsuma,Tsushimaand Matsumae respectively. Nevertheless, Nagasaki was depicted in contemporary art and literature as a cosmopolitan port brimming with exotic curiosities from the Western world.
In 1808, during theNapoleonic Wars, theRoyal NavyfrigateHMSPhaetonentered Nagasaki Harborin search of Dutch trading ships. The local magistrate was unable to resist the crew’s demand for food, fuel, and water, later committingseppukuas a result.Laws were passedin the wake of this incident strengthening coastal defenses, threatening death to intruding foreigners, and prompting the training of English and Russian translators.
TheTōjinyashiki(唐人屋敷) or Chinese Factory in Nagasaki was also an important conduit for Chinese goods and information for the Japanese market. Various Chinese merchants and artists sailed between the Chinese mainland and Nagasaki. Some actually combined the roles of merchant and artist such as 18th centuryYi Hai. It is believed that as much as one-third of the population of Nagasaki at this time may have been Chinese.The Chinese traders at Nagasaki were confined to a walled compound (Tōjin yashiki) which was located in the same vicinity as Dejima island, and the activities of the Chinese, though less strictly controlled than the Dutch, were closely monitored by theNagasaki bugyō.
With theMeiji Restoration, Japan opened its doors once again to foreign trade and diplomatic relations. Nagasaki became atreaty portin 1859 and modernization began in earnest in 1868. Nagasaki was officially proclaimed a city on April 1, 1889. With Christianity legalized and theKakure Kirishitancoming out of hiding, Nagasaki regained its earlier role as a center for Roman Catholicism in Japan.
During theMeiji period, Nagasaki became a center ofheavy industry. Its main industry wasship-building, with the dockyards under control ofMitsubishi Heavy Industriesbecoming one of the prime contractors for theImperial Japanese Navy, and with Nagasaki harbor used as an anchorage under the control of nearbySasebo Naval District. DuringWorld War II, at the time of the nuclear attack, Nagasaki was an important industrial city, containing both plants of the Mitsubishi Steel and Arms Works, the Akunoura Engine Works, Mitsubishi Arms Plant, Mitsubishi Electric Shipyards, Mitsubishi Steel and Arms Works, Mitsubishi-Urakami Ordnance Works, several other small factories, and most of the ports storage and trans-shipment facilities, which employed about 90% of the city's labor force, and accounted for 90% of the city's industry. These connections with the Japanesewar effortmade Nagasaki a major target forstrategic bombingby theAlliesduring the war.
In the 12 months prior to the nuclear attack, Nagasaki had experienced five small-scale air attacks by an aggregate of 136 U.S. planes which dropped a total of 270 tons ofhigh explosives, 53 tons ofincendiaries, and 20 tons offragmentation bombs. Of these, a raid of August 1, 1945, was the most effective, with a few of the bombs hitting the shipyards and dock areas in the southwest portion of the city, several hitting the Mitsubishi Steel and Arms Works, and six bombs landing at the Nagasaki Medical School and Hospital, with three direct hits on buildings there. While the damage from these few bombs was relatively small, it created considerable concern in Nagasaki and a number of people, principally school children, were evacuated to rural areas for safety, consequently reducing the population in the city at the time of the atomic attack.
On the day of the nuclear strike (August 9, 1945) the population in Nagasaki was estimated to be 263,000, which consisted of 240,000 Japanese residents, 10,000 Korean residents, 2,500 conscripted Korean workers, 9,000 Japanese soldiers, 600 conscripted Chinese workers, and 400 AlliedPOWs.That day, theBoeing B-29 SuperfortressBockscar, commanded byMajorCharles Sweeney, departed fromTinian'sNorth Fieldjust before dawn, this time carrying aplutonium bomb, code named "Fat Man". The primary target for the bomb wasKokura, with the secondary target being Nagasaki, if the primary target was too cloudy to make a visual sighting. When the plane reached Kokura at 9:44 a.m. (10:44 am. Tinian Time), the city was obscured by clouds and smoke, as thenearby city of Yahatahad beenfirebombedon the previous day – the steel plant in Yahata had also instructed their workforce to intentionally set fire to containers ofcoal tar, to produce target-obscuring black smoke.Unable to make a bombing attack 'on visual' because of the clouds and smoke, and with limited fuel, the plane left the city at 10:30 a.m. for the secondary target. After 20 minutes, the plane arrived at 10:50 a.m. over Nagasaki, but the city was also concealed by clouds. Desperately short of fuel and after making a couple of bombing runs without obtaining any visual target, the crew was forced to use radar to drop the bomb. At the last minute, the opening of the clouds allowed them to make visual contact with a racetrack in Nagasaki, and they dropped the bomb on the city'sUrakami Valleymidway between the Mitsubishi Steel and Arms Works in the south, and the Mitsubishi-Urakami Ordnance Works in the north.The bomb exploded 47 seconds after its release, at 11:02 a.m. at an approximate altitude of 1,800 feet.
Less than a second after the detonation, the north of the city was destroyed and more than 10% of the city's population were killed.Among the 35,000 deaths were 150 Japanese soldiers, 6,200 out of the 7,500 employees of the Mitsubishi Munitions plant, and 24,000 others (including 2,000Koreans). The industrial damage in Nagasaki was high, leaving 68‍–‍80% of the non-dock industrial production destroyed. It was the second and, to date, the last use of anuclear weaponincombat, and also the second detonation of a plutonium bomb. The first combat use of a nuclear weapon was the "Little Boy" bomb, which was dropped on the Japanese city ofHiroshimaon August 6, 1945. Thefirst plutonium bomb was testedincentral New Mexico, United States, on July 16, 1945. The Fat Man bomb was more powerful than the one dropped over Hiroshima, but because of Nagasaki's more uneven terrain, there was less damage.
The city was rebuilt after the war, albeit dramatically changed. The pace of reconstruction was slow. The first simple emergency dwellings were not provided until 1946. The focus of redevelopment was the replacement of war industries with foreign trade, shipbuilding and fishing. This was formally declared when the Nagasaki International Culture City Reconstruction Law was passed in May 1949.New temples were built, as well as new churches, owing to an increase in the presence of Christianity.Some of the rubble was left as a memorial, such as a one-leggedtoriiatSannō Shrineand an arch nearground zero. New structures were also raised as memorials, such as theAtomic Bomb Museum. Nagasaki remains primarily a port city, supporting a richshipbuildingindustry.
On January 4, 2005, the towns ofIōjima,Kōyagi,Nomozaki,Sanwa,SotomeandTakashima(all fromNishisonogi District) were officially merged into Nagasaki along with the town ofKinkaithe following year.
Nagasaki andNishisonogi Peninsulasare located within the city limits. The city is surrounded by the cities ofIsahayaandSaikai, and the towns ofTogitsuandNagayoinNishisonogi District.
Nagasaki lies at the head of a long bay that forms the best natural harbor on the island of Kyūshū. The main commercial and residential area of the city lies on a small plain near the end of the bay. Two rivers divided by a mountain spur form the two main valleys in which the city lies. The heavily built-up area of the city is confined by the terrain to less than 4 square miles (10 km).
Nagasaki has the typicalhumid subtropical climateof Kyūshū and Honshū, characterized by mild winters and long, hot, and humid summers. Apart fromKanazawaandShizuoka, it is the wettest sizeable city in Japan. In the summer, the combination of persistent heat and high humidity results in unpleasant conditions, withwet-bulb temperaturessometimes reaching 26 °C (79 °F). In the winter, however, Nagasaki is drier and sunnier thanGotōto the west, and temperatures are slightly milder than further inland in Kyūshū. Since records began in 1878, the wettest month has been July 1982, with 1,178 millimetres (46 in) including 555 millimetres (21.9 in) in a single day, whilst the driest month has been September 1967, with 1.8 millimetres (0.07 in). Precipitation occurs year-round, though winter is the driest season; rainfall peaks sharply in June and July. August is the warmest month of the year. On January 24, 2016, a snowfall of 17 centimetres (6.7 in) was recorded.
The nearest airport isNagasaki Airportin the nearby city ofŌmura. TheKyushu Railway Company(JR Kyushu) provides rail transportation on theNishi Kyushu ShinkansenandNagasaki Main Line, whose terminal is atNagasaki Station. In addition, theNagasaki Electric Tramwayoperates five routes in the city. TheNagasaki Expresswayserves vehicular traffic with interchanges at Nagasaki and Susukizuka. In addition, sixnational highwayscrisscross the city:Route 34,202,206,251,324, and499.
OnAugust 9, 1945, the population was estimated to be 263,000. As of March 1, 2017, the city had a population of 505,723 and a population density of 1,000 people per km.
Nagasaki is represented in theJ.Leagueof football with its local club,V-Varen Nagasaki.
The NagasakiLantern Festivalis celebrated annually over the first 15 days ofChinese New Yearand is the largest of its kind in all of Japan.Kunchi, the most famous festival in Nagasaki, is held from October 7–9.
ThePrince Takamatsu Cup Nishinippon Round-Kyūshū Ekiden, the world's longestrelay race, begins in Nagasaki each November.
The city of Nagasaki maintainssister citiesor friendship relations with other cities worldwide.