Камакура қаласы: тарихы мен географиясы

officially Kamakura City (鎌倉市) is a city of Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan. It is located in the Kanto region on the island of Honshu. The city has an estimated population of 172,929 (1 September 2020) and a population density of 4,359 people per km2 over the total area of Kamakura was designated as a city on 3 November 1939. Kamakura is one of Japan's ancient capitals, alongside Kyoto and Nara, and it served as the seat of the Kamakura shogunate from 1185 to 1333, established by Minamoto no Yoritomo. It was the first military government in Japan's history. After the downfall of the shogunate, Kamakura saw a temporary decline. However, during the Edo period, it regained popularity as a tourist destination among the townspeople of Edo. Despite suffering significant losses of historical and cultural assets due to the Great Kantō Earthquake in 1923, Kamakura continues to be one of the major tourist attractions in the Kanto region, known for its historical landmarks such as Tsurugaoka Hachimangū and the Great Buddha of Kamakura.

Surrounded to the north, east, and west by hills and to the south by the open water of Sagami Bay, Kamakura is a natural fortress. Again according to the Azuma Kagami, the first of the Kamakura shōgun, Minamoto no Yoritomo, chose it as a base partly because it was his ancestors' land (his yukari no chi), partly because of these physical characteristics. From the north to the east, Kamakura is surrounded by Mt. Rokkokuken (六国見) , Mt. Ōhira (大平山) , Mt. Jubu (鷲峰山) , Mt. Tendai (天台山) , and Mt. Kinubari (衣張山) , which extend all the way to Iijimagasaki and Wakae Island, on the border with Kotsubo and Zushi. and the important Kobukorozaka and Kamegayatsu Passes, two of Kamakura's Seven Entrances, led directly to it. Its name at the time used to be Sakado gō (尺度郷). The border post used to lie about a hundred meters past today's Kita Kamakura train station in Ofuna's direction. Walking from the beach toward the shrine, one passes through three torii, or Shinto gates, called respectively [[Wakamiya Ōji#Ichi no Torii , [[Wakamiya Ōji#The dankazura and Ni no Torii and [[Wakamiya Ōji#San no Torii Between the first and the second lies Geba Yotsukado which, as the name indicates, was the place where riders had to get off their horses in deference to Hachiman and his shrine. the population of Kamakura has remained relatively steady in recent decades.

The earliest traces of human settlements in the area date back at least 10,000 years. Obsidian and stone tools found at excavation sites near 常楽寺 (鎌倉市) were dated to the Old Stone Age (between 100,000 and 10,000 years ago). During the Jōmon period, the sea level was higher than now and all the flat land in Kamakura up to Tsurugaoka Hachiman gū and, further east, up to Yokohama's Totsuka ku and Sakae ku was under water. Thus, the oldest pottery fragments found come from hillside settlements of the period between 7500 BC and 5000 BC. In the late Jōmon period the sea receded and civilization progressed. During the Yayoi period (300 BC–300 AD), the sea receded further almost to today's coastline, and the economy shifted radically from hunting and fishing to farming. The Azuma Kagami describes pre shogunate Kamakura as a remote, forlorn place, but there is reason to believe its writers simply wanted to give the impression that prosperity had been brought there by the new regime. To the contrary, it is known that by the Nara period (about 700 AD) there were both temples and shrines. Sugimoto dera for example was built during this period and is therefore one of the city's oldest temples. and is also mentioned in the Man'yōshū as well as in the Wamyō Ruijushō of 938. However, the city clearly appears in the historical record only with Minamoto no Yoritomo's founding of the Kamakura shogunate in 1192. There are various hypotheses about the origin of the name. According to the most likely theory, Kamakura, surrounded as it is on three sides by mountains, was likened both to a cooking hearth (竃) and to a warehouse (倉), because both only have one side open. It used to be also called Renpu (鎌府) (short for Kamakura Shogunate (鎌倉幕府)).

The extraordinary events, the historical characters and the culture of the twenty years which go from Minamoto no Yoritomo's birth to the assassination of the last of his sons have been throughout Japanese history the background and the inspiration for countless poems, books, jidaigeki TV dramas, Kabuki plays, songs, manga and even videogames; and are necessary to make sense of much of what one sees in today's Kamakura. Yoritomo, after the defeat and almost complete extermination of his family at the hands of the Taira clan, managed in the space of a few years to go from being a fugitive hiding from his enemies inside a tree trunk to being the most powerful man in the land. Defeating the Taira clan, Yoritomo became de facto ruler of much of Japan and founder of the Kamakura shogunate, an institution destined to last 141 years and to have immense repercussions over the country's history. The Kamakura shogunate era is called by historians the Kamakura period and, although its end is clearly set (Siege of Kamakura (1333)), its beginning is not. Different historians put Kamakura's beginning at a different point in time within a range that goes from the establishment of Yoritomo's first military government in Kamakura (1180) to his elevation to the rank of (征夷大将軍) in 1192. It used to be thought that during this period, effective power had moved completely from the Emperor in Kyoto to Yoritomo in Kamakura, but the progress of research has revealed this was not the case. He was succeeded by his 17 year old son Minamoto no Yoriie under the regency of his maternal grandfather Hōjō Tokimasa. A long and bitter fight ensued in which entire clans like the Hatakeyama, the Hiki, and the Wada were wiped out by the Hōjō who wished to get rid of Yoritomo's supporters and consolidate their power. Yoriie did become head of the Minamoto clan and was regularly appointed shōgun in 1202 but by that time, real power had already fallen into the hands of the Hōjō clan. In 1293, a severe earthquake killed 23,000 people and seriously damaged the city. In the confusion following the quake, Hōjō Sadatoki, the Shikken of the Kamakura shogunate, carried out a purge against his subordinate Taira no Yoritsuna. In what is referred to as the Heizen Gate Incident, Yoritsuna and 90 of his followers were killed. The Hōjō regency however continued until Nitta Yoshisada destroyed it in 1333 at the Siege of Kamakura. It was under the regency that Kamakura acquired many of its best and most prestigious temples and shrines, for example Tsurugaoka Hachiman gū, Kenchō ji, Engaku ji, Jufuku ji, Jōchi ji, and Zeniarai Benten Shrine. The Hōjō family crest in the city is therefore still ubiquitous. From the middle of the thirteenth century, the fact that the vassals (the gokenin) were allowed to become de facto owners of the land they administered, coupled to the custom that all gokenin children could inherit, led to the parcelization of the land and to a consequent weakening of the shogunate. This, and not lack of legitimacy, was the primary cause of the Hōjō's fall. According to The Institute for Research on World Systems, Kamakura was the 4th largest city in the world in 1250 AD, with 200,000 people, and Japan's largest, eclipsing Kyoto by 1200 AD. Yet, despite Kamakura's annihilation of Kyoto based political and military power at the Battle of Dan no ura in 1185, and the failure of the Emperor to free himself from Kamakura's control during the Jōkyū War, Takahashi (2005) has questioned whether Kamakura's nationwide political hegemony actually existed. warlord Nitta Yoshisada, who was an Emperor loyalist, attacked Kamakura to reestablish imperial rule. After trying to enter by land through the Kewaizaka Pass and the Gokuraku ji Pass, he and his forces waited for a low tide, bypassed the Inamuragasaki cape, entered the city and took it. In accounts of that disastrous Hōjō defeat it is recorded that nearly 900 Hōjō samurai, including the last three Regents, committed suicide at their family temple, Tōshō ji, whose ruins have been found in today's Ōmachi. Almost the entire clan vanished at once, the city was sacked and many temples were burned. Many simple citizens imitated the Hōjō, and an estimated total of over 6,000 died on that day of their own hand. The situation in Kantō after 1333 continued to be tense, with Hōjō supporters staging sporadic revolts here and there. He was in his turn defeated in Koshigoe by Ashikaga Takauji, who had come in force from Kyoto to help his brother. The Ashikaga then decided to permanently stay in Kyoto, making Kamakura instead the capital of the (鎌倉府) (or (関東府)), a region including the provinces of Sagami, Musashi, Awa, Kazusa, Shimōsa, Hitachi, Kozuke, Shimotsuke, Kai, and Izu, to which were later added Mutsu and Dewa, making it the equivalent to today's Kanto, plus the Shizuoka and Yamanashi Prefectures. Kamakura's ruler was called kantō kubō, a title equivalent to shōgun assumed by Ashikaga Takauji's son Motouji after his nomination to Kantō kanrei, or deputy shōgun, in 1349. Motouji transferred his original title to the Uesugi family, which had previously held the hereditary title of (執事), and would thereafter provide the Kantō kanrei. The kantō kubō era is essentially a struggle for the shogunate between the Kamakura and the Kyoto branches of the Ashikaga clan, because both believed they had a valid claim to power. In the end, Kamakura had to be retaken by force in 1454.

After the Meiji Restoration, Kamakura's great cultural assets, its beach, and the mystique that surrounded its name made it as popular as it is now, and for essentially the same reasons. The shrine also had to destroy Buddhism related buildings, for example its tahōtō tower, its (御堂), and its shichidō garan. Some Buddhist temples were simply closed, like Zenkō ji, to which the now independent Meigetsu in used to belong. In 1890, the railroad, which until then had arrived just to Ofuna, reached Kamakura bringing in tourists and new residents, and with them a new prosperity. It was reported that the sea receded at an unprecedented velocity, and then waves rushed back towards the shore in a great wall of water over seven meters high, drowning some and crushing others beneath an avalanche of waterborne debris. The total death toll from earthquake, tsunami, and fire exceeded 2,000 victims. Large sections of the shore simply slid into the sea; and the beach area near Kamakura was raised up about six feet; or in other words, where there had only been a narrow strip of sand along the sea, a wide expanse of sand was fully exposed above the waterline. Many temples founded centuries ago have required restoration, and it is for this reason that Kamakura has just one National Treasure in the building category (the Shariden at Engaku ji). Much of Kamakura's heritage was for various reasons over the centuries first lost and later rebuilt.

Kamakura has many festivals ( (祭り)) and other events in each of the seasons, usually based on its rich historical heritage. They are often sponsored by private businesses and, unlike those in Kyoto, they are relatively small scale events attended mostly by locals and a few tourists. January in particular has many because it is the first month of the year, so authorities, fishermen, businesses and artisans organize events to pray for their own health and safety, and for a good and prosperous working year. Kamakura's numerous temples and shrines, first among them city symbols Tsurugaoka Hachiman gū and Kenchō ji, organize many events too, bringing the total to over a hundred.

Besides the Seven Entrances there is another great pass in the city, the huge Shakadō Pass (釈迦堂切通), which connects Shakadōgayatsu to the Ōmachi and Nagoe (formerly called Nagoshi) districts. According to the plaque near the pass itself, the name derives from the fact that third Shikken Hōjō Yasutoki built here a Shakadō (a Buddhist temple devoted to Shakyamuni) dedicated to his father Yoshitoki's memory. The original location of the temple is unclear, but it was closed some time in the middle Muromachi period. In any case, the presence of two [[yagura (tombs) tombs within it means that it can be dated to at least the Kamakura period. It was then an important way of transit, but it was also much narrower than today and harder to pass. Yagura are caves dug on the side of hills during the Middle Ages to serve as tombs for high ranking personalities and priests. The City Council consists of 28 members.

Kamakura has many historical houses. Tukikagetei is one of the famous houses. It had constructed 100 years ago in the Taisho era. But now, Fukagawa Geisha uses this house for their lives.