For a little part in Japan’s history there were a group of pirates that caused problems not just for Japan but also for Korea and China. They were the Wokou. The term wokou is Chinese in origin and comes from the words Wo (referring to either dwarfs of the Japanese) and kòu (which means “bandit”.) These were pirates from various origins and ethnic mostly from Chinese, Korean and Japan. 

There are two distinct eras of piracy involving the Wokou, the 14th century and the 16th century. We will focus on the early wokou, which set up camp on the Japanese islands, opposed to the wokou of the 16th century who were mostly non-Japanese. Early record report that the main camps of the early wokou pirates were the island of Tsushima, Iki Island, and the Goto Islands.

Korean scholar-official and diplomat Jeong Mong-ju was dispatched to Japan to deal with the problem, and during his visit the Kyushu governor Imagawa Sadayo suppressed the pirates, later returning their captured property and people to Korea. Records also show that in 1405 Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, the 3rd shōgun of the Ashikaga shogunate sent twenty captured pirates to China, where they were boiled in a cauldron in Ningbo. 

While pirates are well known in the Western World, and piracy is even alive and well in one form or another it is quite interesting to know that even Japan had problems with pirates. They may not be the grand nice pirates like Luffy and his Straw Hat Crew from the anime One Piece, but they were a part of history and deserve to be remembered. And if you think Japan is finished with its history with pirates, it may not be the case. In 2013 a Somali pirate received an 11-year jail sentence in Japan.