home islands
Americanplural noun
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the Japanese archipelago (excluding Sakhalin), especially as distinguished from Japan’s former colonies and its other territories.
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History/Historical. the progressively limited areas over which the Japanese emperor retained sovereignty during the end of World War II.
Etymology
Origin of home islands
First recorded in 1800–10, in reference to the British Isles
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The U.S. electorate believed Truman was right to avoid what Winston Churchill had called the “effusions of American blood” necessary to conquer Japan’s home islands.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 12, 2025
The displaced residents have fought for years in the courts for the right to return to their home islands, which the U.K. calls the British Indian Ocean Territory.
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 14, 2022
A Navy demolitions expert, Draper Kauffman, would have been among the first to land on the beaches of Kyushu had an invasion of Japan’s home islands been deemed necessary.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 11, 2020
The Doolittle Raid, a 1942 attack on the Japanese home islands that raised morale in the wake of Pearl Harbor.
From Slate ● Jan. 19, 2020
The weather records showed that for five years there had never been two successive good visual bombing days over Tokyo, indicating what might be expected over other targets in the home islands.
From The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by United States. Army. Corps of Engineers. Manhattan District
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
