Abstract

Until now, through the results of several previous studies, it is thought that it was fully revealed that Japan did not recognize Dokdo as a territory of Japan before it was forced to annex it to its territory in 1905. However, during the Japanese colonial period, it was difficult to prove that Dokdo was Korean territory because all of the Korean territory became Japanese territory. Nevertheless, history is not cut off from time to time, but still exists under continuity. Even if Japan, by law, made Dokdo one-sided as its territory, the perception that Dokdo is an island attached to Ulleungdo will not suddenly disappear. This study aims to examine how Dokdo's perception appeared in Japanese materials related to Ulleungdo and Dokdo during the Japanese occupation. The data for this study were donated by Nam Hoon Kim, donated to the Independence Hall of Korea in 2017, research papers related to Ulleungdo and Dokdo written by Japanese scholars during the Japanese colonial period, Matsue City, Shimane Prefecture It is a document called "About the Incorporation of Takeshima" that I directly collected at the Takeshima Research Institute. The research results are as follows. First, Shiba Kazumori's Japanese History Map (1922) wrote Takeshima(=Dokdo) as the territory of Korea, revealing that it recognized Dokdo as an island attached to Ulleungdo. This was largely influenced by Yoshida Togo's "The Great Japanese geographic dictionary", which was called the Giant of Japanese Geography. This coincides with the perception of Japanese territorial maps before and after the Korean annexation introduced in the "New Japanese history map" published by Yoshida Togo. Furthermore, since Shiba Kazumori's perspective was reflected in the writings of research colleague Akira Fujita. Shiba Kazumori's perception was not limited to him. An example of recognizing Dokdo as an affiliated island of Ulleungdo can also be found in research papers written by Japanese scholars during the Japanese colonial period. In other words, studies by Tabohashi Kiyoshi and Imamura Tomo revealed the perception of Dokdo as a sub-island of Ulleungdo by declaring Ulleungdo as Takeshima(竹島) and Dokdo as Matsushima(松島). Setko Hibata directly determined Dokdo as an island of Ulleungdo. On the other hand, Japanese residents who lived in Ulleungdo during the Japanese colonial period testified that Dokdo was clearly visible on Ulleungdo on a clear day. Despite the fact that Dokdo was incorporated as a Japanese territory in Shimane Prefecture under the name of Takeshima(竹島), Japanese were known as Ryangkodo and Koreans were Dokdo(獨島). The fact that it is called is a part where it can be confirmed that the previous methods and habits continue in life regardless of changes in the system. Also, it is recorded as Dokdo(獨島) in 『島根縣誌』 (1923) and the head of the State Treasury Department of Matsue, Japan (1945), indicating that Japan also recognized Dokdo as an attached island of Ulleungdo. Furthermore, after the administrative district was changed from Oki island governor (島司) to the Oki branch office in 1926, it was left until 1953 without administrative measures for changing the region governing Dokdo. Japan is hiding this fact, but this is an indicator that Japan can guess how Dokdo was perceived during the Japanese occupation. During the Japanese colonial rule, Korea was recognized as the “territory of Japan Empire” by the Korean Merge Treaty, so the Japanese side did not have to separate Dokdo and emphasize it as Japanese territory. In such a situation, regardless of its name, the geographical recognition of Dokdo as a sub-island of Ulleungdo was naturally expressed in Japanese records related to geography. Even Japanese officials have indicated that the island was called “Dokdo(獨島)” by Koreans.

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