3. Tokyo
Tokyo is located on the
eastern side of the main
island Honshū and
includes the Izu Islands
and Ogasawara Islands.
Tokyo Metropolis was
formed in 1943 from the
merger of the former
Tokyo Prefecture and the
city of Tokyo.Tokyo is the
capital of Japan, the
center of the Greater
Tokyo Area, and the
largest metropolitan area
of Japan. It is the seat of
the Japanese government
and the Imperial Palace,
and the home of the
4. Hiroshima
is the capital of Hiroshima
Prefecture, and the largest
city in the Chūgoku region of
western Honshū, the largest
island of Japan. It became
best known as the first city in
history to be destroyed by a
nuclear weapon when the
United States of America
dropped an atomic bomb on it
at 8:15 A.M. on August 6,
1945, near the end of World
War II.
Hiroshima gained municipality
status on April 1, 1889. On
April 1, 1980, Hiroshima
became a designated city.
The city's current mayor is
5. Nagasaki
is the capital and the largest city of
Nagasaki Prefecture on the island
of Kyūshū in Japan. Nagasaki
began as a small fishing village,
formerly part of Nishisonogi
District. It became a center of
Portuguese and others European
peoples' influence in the 16th
through 19th centuries. Nagasaki
was home to a major Imperial
Japanese Navy base during the
First Sino-Japanese War and
Russo-Japanese War.
During World War II, the atomic
bombings of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki made Nagasaki the
second and, to date, last city in the
6. Yokohama
is the capital city of Kanagawa
Prefecture and the second
largest city in Japan by
population after Tokyo. It lies on
Tokyo Bay, south of Tokyo, in
the Kantō region of the main
island of Honshū. It is a major
commercial hub of the Greater
Tokyo Area.
Yokohama's population of 3.6
million makes it Japan's largest
incorporated city.
Yokohama developed rapidly as
Japan's prominent port city
following the end of Japan's
relative isolation in the mid-19th
century, and is today one of its
major ports along with Kobe,
Osaka, Nagoya, Hakata, Tokyo,
and Chiba.
7. Nagoya
is the third-largest incorporated
city and the fourth most
populous urban area in Japan.
Located on the Pacific coast in
the Chūbu region on central
Honshū, it is the capital of Aichi
Prefecture and is one of
Japan's major ports along with
those of Tokyo, Osaka, Kobe,
Yokohama, Chiba, and Moji. It
is also the center of Japan's
third largest metropolitan
region, known as the Chūkyō
Metropolitan Area. As of 2000,
Chūkyō Metropolitan Area has
8.74 million people, of which
2.17 million live in the city of
Nagoya.