The nation of Japan, known in Japanese as Nihon or Nippon (日本), occupies an archipelago off the east coast of Asia. The four main islands are Hokkaidō in the north, Honshū (the largest), Shikoku in the south, and Kyūshū in the southwest. The country includes thousands of other islands of all sizes; among them the Ryūkyū (Nansei) Islands are a long chain extending to the southwest and including the large island of Okinawa, and the Nanpō Islands are another long chain extending south into the Pacific Ocean. Much of Japan is mountainous but the coastal regions are densely populated and urbanized; the country's population is about 126 million. Located at the southwestern end of the Japanese archipelago, the island of Kyūshū is divided into seven prefectures. This page includes lighthouses of the Ōsumi Peninsula and Kagoshima Bay, part of Kagoshima Prefecture, the southernmost prefecture of Kyūshū and of the main islands of Japan. Kagoshima Prefecture also includes the Kushikino Area, the Ōsumi Islands, and the Amami Islands; the two latter groups form the northern half of the Nansei Shotō (Ryukyu Islands). In Japanese, the word for a lighthouse is tōdai or toudai (灯台). The words saki and misaki are for capes and headlands, hana ("nose") is a promontory, hantō is a peninsula, shima (also spelled sima or jima) is an island, bae is a reef, iwa or shi is a rocky reef, amase or se is a shoal, wan is a bay, nada is a sound or basin, kaikyō is a strait, kawa is a river, and kō or minato is a harbor. Lighthouses in Japan are operated and maintained by the Japanese Coast Guard's Maritime Safety Agency. There is at least one Coast Guard Section Office in each prefecture, often two or more. Lighthouses on this page are maintained by the Coast Guard office at Kagoshima City. ARLHS numbers are from the ARLHS World List of Lights. JCG numbers are the Japanese Coast Guard's light list numbers. Admiralty numbers are from volume M of the Admiralty List of Lights & Fog Signals. U.S. NGA List numbers are from Publication 112.
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Ōsumi Peninsula Lighthouses
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Hi Saki Light, Kimotsuki, March 2020 Google Maps photo by ROUTR |
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Ōnejime Kō Light, Kinkō, October 2023 Google Maps photo by S. Katsuragi |
Kagoshima Bay Lighthouses
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Kanoya Breakwater Lights (now lost), Kanoya, March 2010 ex-Panoramio Creative Commons photo by dttx |
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Southern Satsuma Peninsula Lighthouses
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Information available on lost lighthouses:
Notable faux lighthouses:
Adjoining pages: North: Northeast: Miyazaki | South: Ōsumi Islands | West: Kushikino Area
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Posted July 23, 2007. Checked and revised April 3, 2024. Lighthouses: 36. Site copyright 2024 Russ Rowlett and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.