Place Names in Kyushu

Abstract

Place names are so closely connected with topography that it is very interesting to investigate them by means of the maps.
Place name of “Tsuru” …… Many of them are found in Kyushu especially. There are 258 names on the topographical map of 1/50, 000. Originally it means an alluvial plain on the river. When number of settlements was a few, simple name of “Tsuru” can be distinguished from each other. But as the plain has developed, other words were added to “Tsuru” to distinguish itself from others. These surfaced-words were “ue” (upper) “naka” (middle) and “shimo” (lower) (18% of the whole added word), “higashi” (east) “minami” (south), “nishi” (west) and “kita” (north) (3%), “dai” (greater) “ko” (smaller) (6%), name of plantation (12%), name of animal (rare), those words referring to topography (slope, between the rivers, river, cape, hill). They are found mainly in Oita and Miyazaki Prefecture and also in Fukuoka, Kumamoto and Kagoshima Prefecture. That is, they are found in the central part of Kyushu especially on the eastern side of it, facing to the Bungo Straight.
Place name of “Koba” …… It means the cultivated land in the forest. There are 147 names on the topographical map of 1/50, 000. In Tsushima Isl, the mountain agriculture is called “Kobazukuri” (burning cultivation) and it makes us infer that this place name is related to the mountain agriculture in Kyushu before Meiji Era. Like the place name of “Tsuru”, in general, an additional word was connected with “Koba” to make a compound word. They are distributed in a group in eastern Kyushu. But its predominant area is differrent from that of “Tsuru”. The place name of “Tsurukoba” is found also in the southern Kumamoto prefecture, connecting with the area of “Tsuru”.
Place name of “Muta” …… 125 names on the 1/50, 000 topographical map. They are distributed in Saga Prefecture, the Tsukushi Plain, the Kumamoto Plain and southern part of Kyushu, that is, between the “Tsuru” area and the “Koba” area in both districts. It means a marshland originally, but at present time those places do not always keep the original characteristic of this name. Additional words are “upper”, “middle” and “lower” and “east”, “south”, “west” and “north”, which are found at the same percent (9%) of the total. Here the place name of “Tsuru” and “Koba” are also mixed, but they scarecely added “east”, “south”, “west” and “north” as the additional words. This is because the place name of “Muta” is much found on the largest plains in Kyushu stretching eastwards from north of the Ariake Bay where water ways are diversed and formed net -like landscape.