Akumi County was formerly part of
Dewa Province, and was mentioned in the
Engishiki records of the early
Heian period. The area came to be known as Yuza District from the
Sengoku period through the
Edo period. Under the
Tokugawa shogunate, much of the area was ruled as part of
Tsuruoka Domain or its subsidiary domain,
Matsumine Domain. Following the
Meiji restoration it came under the new province of
Uzen Province, which became part of Yamagata Prefecture in 1876. At that time, the area consisted of two towns and 154 villages. The area became and was organized as Akumi District in 1878. With the establishment of the municipality system on April 1, 1889, two towns (Sakata and Matsumine) and 27 villages were established. akata was raised to city status on April 1, 1933, and Yura was raised to town status on April 1, 1941. The town of Yawata was created on December 1, 1954, and Hirata was elevated to town status on August 1, 1964. On November 1, 2005, as part of the
Heisei period Municipal mergers and dissolutions in Japan, the city of
Sakata and the towns of
Hirata,
Matsuyama and
Yawata merged to form the new city of
Sakata. == References ==