The whole island of Kuroshima was designated an Important Cultural Landscape in September 2011.
Nature can be harsh on Kuroshima, but the inhabitants made clever use of the island’s topography and plants like the sea fig tree, to develop their own way of coexisting with the natural world. Cultivating the red earth and harvesting the sea, they offered prayers of thanks for the island’s bounty.
The landscape of Kuroshima reflects the island’s unique culture, based on the natural properties and the hard toil of the people who lived here.
The old landscape is very well preserved (especially around (6) on the map), and you can see the traditional land-use patterns of the settlers, as the land was developed inward from the shore.