William When Kato Kiyomasa was summoned from his native Aichi prefecture to become Lord of Kumamoto, he took umbrage at its kanji - 隈本 - which literally means “foot of the hinterlands,” so rewrote it with a homonym, 熊本, which means “origin of bears,” despite the fact that no bears live in Kumamoto. But at least that gave rise to Kumamon. A reference of relative bear sizes, none of which live in Kumamoto: