Traditionally, the home of the
Emperor is considered the capital. From 794 through 1868, the Emperor lived in
Heian-kyō, modern-day
Kyoto. After 1868, the seat of the
Government of Japan and the location of the Emperor's home was moved to
Edo, which it renamed Tokyo. This term for capital was never used to refer to Kyoto. Indeed,
shuto came into use during the 1860s as a
gloss of the English term "capital". In 1941, the
Ministry of Education published the . The
Ministry of Education published a book called "History of the Restoration" in 1941. This book referred to without talking about . A contemporary history textbook states that the
Meiji government "moved the capital (
shuto) from Kyoto to Tokyo" without using the
sento term. In 1999, the following sites were proposed:
Tochigi and
Fukushima prefectures, north of Tokyo; the second candidate is
Gifu and
Aichi prefectures, south of Tokyo; and the panel recommended the third region near the ancient capitals, Nara, Kyoto, and
Shiga prefectures. These plans did not include moving the
Imperial Palace, so they were not seen as moving the capital city but rather transferring the government functions.
Ryutaro Hashimoto explicitly denied the possibility of moving the capital city (i.e. moving the Imperial Palace) in 1996. The plans for moving were not made later on. As of 2007, there is a movement to transfer the government functions of the capital from Tokyo while retaining Tokyo as the
de facto capital, with the Gifu-Aichi region, the Mie-Kio region and other regions submitting bids for a
de jure capital. Officially, the relocation is referred to as "capital
functions relocation" instead of "capital relocation", or as "relocation of the
Diet and other organizations". In 2023, the
Government of Japan moved the
Agency for Cultural Affairs to Kyoto. This was the first time that a central government office has been relocated outside Tokyo since Tokyo was designated as the capital. ==List of capitals==