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The , also known as the , is the westernmost region of Honshū, the largest island of Japan. It consists of the prefectures of Hiroshima, Okayama, Shimane, Tottori and Yamaguchi.〔Chugoku Regional Tourism Promotion Association ("Overview of Chugoku Region" ), ''Chugoku Regional Tourism Portal Site: Navigate Chugoku''. Accessed 15 September 2013.〕 In 2010 it had a population of 7,563,428.〔 == History == “Chūgoku” literally means “middle country”, but the origin of the name is unclear. Historically, Japan was divided into a number of provinces called ''koku'', which were in turn classified according to both their power and their distances from the administrative center in Kansai. Under the latter classification, most provinces are divided into “near countries” (近国 ''kingoku''), “middle countries” (中国 ''chūgoku''), and “far countries” (遠国 ''ongoku''). Therefore, one explanation is that Chūgoku was originally used to refer to the collection of “middle countries” to the west of the capital. However, only five (less than half) of the provinces normally considered part of Chūgoku region were in fact classified as middle countries, and the term never applied to the many middle countries to the east of Kansai. Therefore, an alternative explanation is that Chūgoku referred to provinces between Kansai and Kyūshū, which was historically important as the link between Japan and mainland Asia. Historically, Chūgoku referred to the 16 provinces of San’indō (山陰道) and San’yōdō (山陽道), which led to the region’s alternative name described below. However, because some of the easternmost provinces were later subsumed into prefectures based primarily in Kansai, those areas are, strictly speaking, not part of the Chūgoku region in modern usage. In Japanese, the characters 中国 and the reading ''Chūgoku'' began to be used to mean “China” after the founding of the Republic of China. The same characters are used in Chinese to refer to China, but pronounced ''Zhōngguó'', lit. “''Middle Kingdom''” or “''Middle Country''” (Wade Giles: ''Chungkuo''). It is similar to the use of the West Country in English for a region of England. Primarily in the tourism industry, in order to avoid confusing the Chūgoku region with China, the Chūgoku region is also called the “San’in‐San’yō region”. San’in (“yīn of the mountains”) is the northern part facing the Sea of Japan. San’yō (“yáng of the mountains”) is the southern part facing the Seto Inland Sea. These names were created using the yīnyáng‐based place‐naming scheme. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Chūgoku region」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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