2
Climate and environment in
history
Bruce L. Batten
History is the study of the human past. Historians are thus concerned with people’s individual
and collective deeds and characteristics and how those things have changed over time. As a
species, Homo sapiens has existed for perhaps 200,000 years. The number of individuals to have
lived exceeds 100 billion.^1 That leaves historians with a lot of room for study, even if they limit
their attention to the 5,000 years or so since the invention of writing.
But wait, there’s more: the natural environment. Although some historical writing treats
society as though it exists in a vacuum and develops according to its own internal logic, such is
not the case. It is true that certain aspects of the human experience, for example intellectual
trends, bear no obvious relation to our physical surroundings. But all material aspects of our lives
are influenced—or at least enabled—by our natural environment. And that environment is in
turn affected by our own activities. These premises underlie the relatively new field of environ-
mental history.^2
The environmental history of Japan is the subject of this chapter. The field is not yet mature,
so I am unable to provide a “how- to” introduction. Instead, I will describe how scholars have
addressed the following questions: What is the nature of the Japanese environment, and how has
it changed over time? How has the environment influenced society? How have humans altered
their environment or responded to its challenges? (For reasons of space, my approach ignores
Japanese attitudes toward nature, which undoubtedly have had some effect on people’s actions.)
I will conclude with a brief recapitulation on sources, some suggestions for further reading, and
a hortatory call to action. Although the coverage of this book technically ceases at 1600 ce, this
chapter occasionally spills over into more recent times for narrative purposes or to make a
point.
Reconstruction of past environments
The basic facts of Japan’s physical environment are more properly the subject of the previous
chapter on geography, but there seems no harm in summarizing them here.^3 Japan is an island
country located off the eastern coast of the Asian mainland. It consists of four main islands (from
north to south, Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu) and thousands of smaller ones, as well
as adjacent territorial seas. The country spans over 3,000 km from northeast to southwest and has