The Chūgoku region (中国地方 Chūgoku-chihō), also known as the San'in-San'yō region (山陰山陽地方 San'in san'yō-chihō), is the westernmost region of Honshū, the largest island of Japan.
It consists of the prefectures of Hiroshima, Okayama, Shimane, Tottori and Yamaguchi.[2] As of 2010 it has a population of 7,563,428.[1]
“Chūgoku” literally means “middle country”.
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).
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.
The Chūgoku region is characterized by irregular rolling hills and
limited plain areas and is divided into two distinct parts by mountains
running east and west through its center.
The city of Hiroshima, the "capital" of the Chūgoku region, was rebuilt after being destroyed by an atomic bomb in 1945, and is now an industrial metropolis of more than one million people.
Kyūshū, Shikoku, and Kansai neighbor the Chūgoku region.
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