Ainu people

The Ainu people Ainu Mosir, the land of the Ainu: Hokkaido, Tohoku's north, Sakhalin, the Kurils, Kamchatka and the Okhotsk shore, since before Yamato Japanese and Russians came. Counted among Japan's primary historic peoples with Yamato and Ryukyuans, and its few native minorities, they numbered 11,450 counted in Hokkaido in 2023, 300 in Russia, and perhaps 200,000 assimilated in Japan. Bear-sending iomante rites, inau prayer sticks, attus elm-bark robes and yukar epics chanted through nights ordered a salmon-fishing, deer-hunting world. Japanese basho trading posts, Meiji land theft and Soviet deportations from Sakhalin and the Kurils broke it; assimilation laws buried the language. The 2019 Ainu law, Upopoy museum, Nibutani carvers and the Ainu radio hour keep Mosir's first people praying. Hokkaido's 11,450 counted Ainu keep the towns. Russia's 300 Ainu keep Sakhalin memory. Two hundred thousand assimilated Ainu hide in plain sight. Tohoku, Sakhalin and Kuril kin share the festivals.