Kanagawa History & Heritage Guide 2025

Archaeological sites throughout Kanagawa, particularly in Yokohama and the Miura Peninsula, show evidence of Jomon hunter-gatherer settlements. Shell middens and stone tools have been found at Natsushima in Yokosuka.

Agricultural communities established in river valleys. The area remained peripheral to the political centers of Yamato (Nara) and later Asuka.

Minamoto no Yoritomo established Japan's first military government (bakufu) in Kamakura in 1185, making this fishing village Japan's de facto capital for nearly 150 years. The period saw the flourishing of Zen Buddhism, samurai culture, and the construction of the Great Buddha (1252).

Kamakura Shogunate fell in 1333. The Hojo clan controlled Kanagawa from Odawara Castle through much of the Sengoku (Warring States) era. The Hojo were defeated by Toyotomi Hideyoshi at the Siege of Odawara in 1590.

The Tokaido road — Japan's most important highway — ran through Kanagawa, passing through the post towns of Hodogaya, Totsuka, Fujisawa, and Odawara. Kanagawa-juku (modern Yokohama area) was a key waystation between Edo and Kyoto.

The most transformative period in Kanagawa's history. In 1854 Commodore Perry signed the Convention of Kanagawa at Yokohama, ending Japan's 250 years of isolation. In 1859 Yokohama was formally opened as a treaty port, rapidly becoming Japan's most cosmopolitan city.

The Great Kanto Earthquake of September 1923 devastated Yokohama and Kamakura. Yokohama was rebuilt along modernist lines and became a major naval and industrial base. The city suffered severe bombing in 1945.

Yokohama hosted the US military base and became central to Japan's post-war economic recovery. The Minato Mirai 21 waterfront redevelopment project, begun in the 1980s, transformed former industrial docks into a world-class urban district.