Ezo and the northern islands

Who rules

Title

No ruler: villages (kotan) and their elders; no chief is named by any source for 1200

Since

not applicable

Family

The peoples are known by archaeology and by a few brief Japanese notices; the word Ainu for them as a people is not used in the sources of 1200 (the Japanese called them Ezo or Emishi).

Confidence

low

Archaeology as summarised on English Wikipedia (Satsumon culture, Okhotsk culture, Ainu people, Emishi); no local writing exists; the Japanese court and Kamakura notices are few and were not opened.

Overlord

none. Kamakura's stewards in Mutsu claim the old frontier of the Emishi and the court calls the peoples beyond the strait Ezo, but no source we could read shows tribute or a post north of the strait in 1200.

What the realm holds

• The salmon rivers and estuary villages of southern and western Hokkaido (Ishikari, Shiribeshi, Iburi, Hidaka)
• The Oshima peninsula (Watarishima), the landing-place for the Tsugaru strait
• The Okhotsk and Pacific coasts of eastern Hokkaido and the sea-mammal hunting grounds
• Rebun, Rishiri and the sea between them and Wakkanai (Okhotsk-culture sites at Rebun)
• The tip of Sakhalin round Aniva Bay and the southern Kurils (Kunashir, Shikotan, Habomai, Etorofu)

How it was acquired

Nobody 'acquired' it: the Satsumon culture spread north from the Tōhoku into southern Hokkaido and the Okhotsk culture came down the Okhotsk coast from about the fifth century (English Wikipedia).

Allies and rivals

Trading partners: Tsugaru and Dewa merchants and fishermen, the Nivkh and other Amur peoples on the Sakhalin side. No war with anyone is known in 1200. The Mongol campaigns on Sakhalin (from 1264) and the raids that provoke them are far in the future.

The realm that morning

Winter: drift ice closes the Okhotsk coast; the Sea of Japan coast is stormy and the Tsugaru crossing is dangerous; the villages live on dried salmon and stored grain. Nothing in the sources dates any event in these lands in the winter of 1199 to 1200.

Wealth

Salmon, kelp, furs, eagle feathers, falcons, sea-mammal oil and hides; imported iron kettles, tools, cloth and rice. No figure.

Military

No warrior class is known. Fortified enclosures (chashi) belong to the later Ainu period and are not drawn.

Threats

• Hard winters and the cooling of the climate (English Wikipedia suggests the Little Ice Age made the Kurils hard to live in)
• Japanese merchants and officials working up the Tsugaru coast
• The movement of Nivkh, Tungus and later Mongol forces in the Amur country, a century or more away

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

1. 1200 to 1300, looselyThe Satsumon pass into the Ainu culture and the Okhotsk remnants are absorbed; ironware and trade grow. Not a dated event.Depends on: Continuing trade with the Honshu coast Stopped by: A collapse of that trade

Later, on the likely course

1. 1264 (30 November by English Wikipedia's rendering)Mongol attack on the Sakhalin Ainu after raids on the Nivkh; the Mongols had set a post at Nurgan in 1263.Depends on: The Mongol conquest of the Jin (1234) and the Amur peoples Stopped by: Not in play in 1200

Places of note

• Tsugaru strait crossing (Tappi to Matsumae): The narrowest crossing, about twenty kilometres; Matsumae as a town is of the 1590s and not drawn
• Hamanaka 2 (Rebun), an Okhotsk-culture site: A site named by English Wikipedia; coordinates are for the island
• Moyoro shell-mound (Abashiri), an Okhotsk-culture site: Named by English Wikipedia; approximate position

Where the sources disagree

• The campaign board has no Ezo places. Hakodate, Sapporo, Rishiri, Rebun and the southern Kurils are given to this sheet by the ownership tool; Kunashir, Shikotan, Habomai, Etorofu and the Sakhalin tip lie in Russian territory today.
• English Wikipedia's Satsumon page dates the culture 700 to 1200 and does not say when the Ainu culture begins; the Ainu page says about the 13th century. We treat 1200 as a transition, not a date.
• English Wikipedia's Emishi page says both Emishi and Ainu were called Ezo in writing and doubts that the Hiraizumi Fujiwara were Ainu. We draw no Emishi in northern Mutsu as an independent power, because Kamakura's stewards hold it since 1189, but the Mutsu record says that local chiefs of Emishi descent remain.

Evidence: Archaeology only, read second-hand from English Wikipedia. No chief, king, castle or border is drawn where no source gives one.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

On the map: Soft, wide shapes for peoples who left no boundaries. The Hokkaido outline follows the island; the Sakhalin tip and the Kurils follow the coast roughly.

Primary sources for this realm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Mirror of the East, Anonymous; compiled by officials of the Kamakura shogunate (compiled about 1300 from the shogunate's records, diaries and family documents). The Kamakura house's own chronicle, in daily entries. Read online