Kurushima

Kurushima is a Japanese island in the Inland Sea. Administratively, it forms part of the city of Imabari, Ehime Prefecture.

Geography

Kurushima is situated some off the coast of Shikoku's Takanawa Peninsula at the entrance to Hashihama Port in Imabari. The island has a coastline of approximately and a surface area of. It is a natural fortress with cliffs to the north shaped by the fast currents and rocks below; there is a settlement on the flatter land to the south, around a small bay. To the east, the Kurushima Straits are spanned by the Kurushima Kaikyō Bridge, while the island is protected as part of Setonaikai National Park.

History

During the Sengoku period, the island was the base of the Kurushima Murakami, one of the three main houses of the Murakami kaizoku. There are still remains of the walls of Kurushima Castle, an element of Japan Heritage "Story" #036, as well as traces of residences and wells. In the Edo period, together with nearby Oshima, the island was part of Kurushima Village in Matsuyama Domain, with an assessment of twenty-six koku, three to, and nine shō. Around the end of the Kyōhō era in the early eighteenth century there were some seventy-eight households, fifty-three of them of fishermen. By Shōwa 53 this number had dropped to thirty-nine households, primarily making a living by commuting to the local shipyards and line fishing. As of 2009, Kurushima had thirty-two residents.