You can helpexpand this article with text translated fromthe corresponding article in Japanese. (March 2025)Click [show] for important translation instructions. Machine translation, likeDeepL orGoogle Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Consideradding a topic to this template: there are already 1,539 articles in themain category, and specifying|topic= will aid in categorization. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. Youmust providecopyright attribution in theedit summary accompanying your translation by providing aninterlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary isContent in this edit is translated from the existing Japanese Wikipedia article at [[:ja:サンカ]]; see its history for attribution. You may also add the template{{Translated|ja|サンカ}} to thetalk page. For more guidance, seeWikipedia:Translation.

TheSanka (サンカ) were a population ofnomadicmountain people who are believed to have once existed inJapan.

TheSanka had no permanent settlements, but lived in bands of wanderinghunter-gatherers. They were known to sometimes visit villages to trade.^[1] It is unknown when and where the Sanka originated.Kita Sadakichi [ja] suggested that they were the descendants of farmers oroutcastes who fled into the mountains duringlong period of civil war in the15th and16th centuries. Until theMeiji period, the termsanka (さんか) was used by Japanese police in reference to itinerant or unemployed people regarded as likely to become criminals.

Early research on theSanka was conducted byYanagita Kunio in the 1910s.^[2][3][4] Around the same time,Takano Yasaburō (鷹野 彌三郎) described theSanka as being entirely criminal in character and a threat to national security. Yanagita criticized Takano's theory, saying that the proclivity for thievery associated with theSanka came from "a difference in [their] conception ofproperty".^[3]

• Cave dweller
• Tsuchigumo, ancient tribes who fought against theearly Japanese state
• Matagi
• Eta
• Ebune [ja]
• Kumosuke [ja]

• 後藤 Gotō, 興善 Kōzen (1989).又鬼と山窩 Matagi and Sanka. Japan: 批評社 Hihyōsha.ISBN 4826502893.

• Society of Japan
• Social history of Japan
• Ethnic groups in Japan
• Japanese caste system
• Nomadic groups in Eurasia

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• Short description is different from Wikidata
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