Sapporo

Sapporo lies on the Ishikari plain, beside rivers whose salmon sustained numerous Ainu settlements. Its name has been explained from Ainu words for either a large dry river or a river with extensive reed marshes. In the late eighteenth century, trading districts established along the Toyohira and other rivers brought Ainu communities into closer commerce with the Matsumae domain. As merchants took over the fisheries, many Ainu became laborers in them. The shogunate placed western Ezo, including Sapporo, under direct control in 1807.