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44-493: Tsunayoshi is known for instituting animal protection laws, particularly for dogs. This earned him the nickname of "the dog Shogun " ( Inu-Kubō 犬公方: Inu= Dog, Kubō =formal title of Shogun). Tokugawa Tsunayoshi was born on February 23, 1646, in Edo. He was the son of Tokugawa Iemitsu by one of his concubines, named Otama, later known as Keishōin 桂昌院 (1627–1705). Tsunayoshi had an elder brother already five years old, who would become

88-437: A bathtub. He married Takatsukasa Takako, daughter of Takatsukasa Nobufusa at 12 December 1623. His relationship with Takako was good but Takako had three miscarriages. In 1623, when Iemitsu was nineteen, Hidetada abdicated the post of shōgun in his favor. Hidetada continued to rule as Ōgosho (retired shōgun ), but Iemitsu nevertheless assumed a role as formal head of the bakufu bureaucracy. He declared in front of

132-421: A brother, who would become a rival, Tadanaga . Tadanaga was his parents' favorite. However, Ieyasu made it clear that Iemitsu would be next in line as shōgun after Hidetada. An obsolete spelling of his given name is Iyemitsu . Parents Consorts and issue: Adopted Daughters: Iemitsu came of age in 1617 and dropped his childhood name in favor of Tokugawa Iemitsu . He also was installed officially as

176-450: A legend that influenced many plays and stories of the era. The most successful of them was a bunraku play called Kanadehon Chūshingura (now simply called Chūshingura , or "Treasury of Loyal Retainers"), written in 1748 by Takeda Izumo and two associates; it was later adapted into a kabuki play, which is still one of Japan's most popular. The earliest known account of the Akō incident in

220-562: A practice in Japan soon after Tsunayoshi's authoritarian laws came into effect. In 1684, Tsunayoshi also decreased the power of the tairō after the assassination of Masatoshi by a cousin in that same year. Nonetheless, due again to maternal advice, Tsunayoshi became very religious, promoting the Neo-Confucianism of Zhu Xi . In 1682, he read to the daimyōs an exposition of the "Great Learning", which became an annual tradition at

264-540: A series of edicts more extensively detailing a system of restrictions on the flow of people, goods, and information in and out of the country. Over the course of the 1630s, Iemitsu issued a series of edicts restricting Japan's dealings with the outside world. The most famous of those edicts was the so-called Sakoku Edict of 1635 , which contained the main restrictions introduced by Iemitsu. With it, he forbade every Japanese ship and person to travel to another country, or to return to Japanese shores. The punishment for violation

308-476: A sizable sum to funding the immense travel expenses associated with the journey (along with a large entourage) to and from Edo. The system also involved the daimyōs ' wives and heirs remaining in Edo, disconnected from their lord and from their home province, serving essentially as hostages who might be harmed or killed if the daimyōs were to plot rebellion against the shogunate. The century-long presence of Catholic traders and missionaries in Japan ended in

352-522: A strong, centralized administration. This made him unpopular with many daimyōs , but Iemitsu simply removed his opponents. His sankin-kōtai system forced daimyōs to reside in Edo in alternating sequence, spending a certain amount of time in Edo, and a certain amount of time in their home provinces. It is often said that one of the key goals of this policy was to prevent the daimyōs from amassing too much wealth or power by separating them from their home provinces, and by forcing them to regularly devote

396-555: A time, the succession remained an open question. Sakai Tadakiyo , one of Ietsuna's most favored advisors, suggested that the succession not pass to someone of the Tokugawa line, but rather to the blood royal, favoring one of the sons of Emperor Go-Sai to become the next shōgun (as during the Kamakura shogunate ) but Tadakiyo was dismissed soon after. Hotta Masatoshi , one of the most brilliant advisors of shōgun Ietsuna's rule,

440-544: A vassal of the Takata to commit suicide because of misgovernment, showing his strict approach to the samurai code. He then confiscated his fief of 250,000 koku . During his reign, he confiscated a total of 1,400,000 koku . In 1682, shōgun Tsunayoshi ordered his censors and police to raise the living standard of the people. Soon, prostitution was banned, waitresses could not be employed in tea houses, and rare and expensive fabrics were banned. Most probably, smuggling began as

484-605: The Xiaojing , is a Confucian classic treatise giving advice on filial piety : that is, how to behave towards a senior such as a father, an elder brother, or a ruler. The text was most likely written during the late Warring States period and early Han dynasty and claims to be a conversation between Confucius and his student Zengzi. The text was widely used during the Han and later dynasties to teach young children basic moral messages as they learned to read. The text dates from

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528-528: The Ainu , the indigenous people of Hokkaido , Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands , as well as limited communication with related peoples on the mainland close to Sakhalin. Japan in this period has often been described as "closed", or under sakoku (鎖国, "chained country"), but since the 1980s, if not earlier, scholars have argued for the use of terms such as 'kaikin" (海禁, "maritime restrictions"), emphasizing

572-506: The shōgun ' s court. He soon began to lecture even more, and in 1690 lectured about Neo-Confucian work to Shinto and Buddhist daimyōs , and even to envoys from the court of Emperor Higashiyama in Kyoto . He also was interested in several Chinese works, namely The Great Learning ( Da Xue ) and The Classic of Filial Piety ( Xiao Jing ). Tsunayoshi also loved art and Noh theater. In 1691, Engelbert Kaempfer visited Edo as part of

616-526: The "date of departure homeward for foreign ships shall not be later than the twentieth day of the ninth month". In addition to this, Iemitsu forbade alterations of the set price for raw silk and thus made sure that competition between trading cities was brought to a minimum. In 1637, an armed revolt arose against Iemitsu's anti-Christian policies in Shimabara , but there were other reasons involved, such as overly-high taxation and cruel treatment of peasants by

660-399: The 1630s when Iemitsu ordered the expulsion of nearly every European from the country. European access to trade relations with Japan was restricted to one Dutch ship each year. Iemitsu's policies on this matter were reinforced after the execution of two Portuguese men who came to plead for the re-establishment of Japan's earlier foreign trade policy. By the end of the 1630s, Iemitsu had issued

704-474: The 4th century BC to 3rd century BC. It is not known who actually wrote the document. It is attributed to a conversation between Confucius and his disciple Zengzi . A 12th-century author named He Yin claimed: "The Classic of Filial Piety was not made by Zengzi himself. When he retired from his conversation (or conversations) with Kung-ne on the subject of Filial Piety, he repeated to the disciples of his own school what (the master) had said, and they classified

748-555: The West was published in 1822 in Isaac Titsingh 's book, Illustrations of Japan . Tsunayoshi's first son Tokugawa Tokumatsu (1679–1683) died at the age of 4 due to illness. In 1704, Tsunayoshi's only surviving child, Tsuruhime died following a miscarriage and a few months after her husband, his son-in-law, Tokugawa Tsunanori of Kii Domain also died. Therefore, Tsunayoshi appointed his nephew, Tokugawa Ienobu , heir apparent in

792-515: The annual Dutch embassy from Dejima in Nagasaki . He journeyed from Nagasaki to Osaka , to Kyoto , and there to Edo . Kaempfer gives us information on Japan during the early reign of Tokugawa Tsunayoshi. As the Dutch embassy entered Edo in 1692, they asked to have an audience with Shogun Tsunayoshi. While they were waiting for approval, a fire destroyed six hundred houses in Edo, and the audience

836-774: The bestowing of the garments invalid. When Lady Kasuga and Masako broke a taboo by visiting the imperial court as a commoner, Go-Mizunoo abdicated, embarrassed, and Meisho became empress . The shōgun was now the uncle of the sitting monarch . In Kan'ei 9, on the 24th day of the 2nd month (1632), Ōgosho Hidetada died, and Iemitsu could assume real power. Worried that his brother Tokugawa Tadanaga might assassinate him, however, he ruled carefully until his brother's death by seppuku in 1633. Hidetada left his advisors, all veteran daimyōs , to act as regents for Iemitsu. In 1633, after his brother's death, Iemitsu dismissed these men. In place of his father's advisors, Iemitsu appointed his childhood friends. With their help Iemitsu created

880-642: The boy (Tsunayoshi) not to be brought up as a samurai/warrior, as was becoming for his station, but be trained as a scholar." His childhood name was Tokumatsu ( 徳松 ). While his father was shōgun , his mother was an adopted daughter of the Honjō family , led by Honjō Munemasa (1580–1639) in Kyoto. His mother's natural parents were merchants in Kyoto. This remarkable woman was very close with Tsunayoshi in his young years, and while his older brother Ietsuna began to rely on regents for much of his reign, Tsunayoshi did exactly

924-424: The city. Therefore, he earned the pejorative title Inu-Kubō (犬公方: Inu= Dog, Kubō =formal title of Shogun). In 1695, there were so many dogs that Edo began to smell horribly. An apprentice was even executed because he wounded a dog. Finally, the issue was taken to an extreme, as over 50,000 dogs were deported to kennels in the suburbs of the city where they would be housed. They were apparently fed rice and fish at

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968-540: The court nobles and the court itself. Yet relations with Go-Mizunoo deteriorated after the Purple Robe Incident ( 紫衣事件 , shi-e jiken ) , during which the Emperor was accused of having bestowed honorific purple garments to more than ten priests despite an edict which banned them for two years (probably in order to break the bond between the Emperor and religious circles). The shogunate intervened, making

1012-779: The edicts, Japan remained very much connected to international commerce, information, and cultural exchange, though only through four avenues. Nagasaki was the center of trade and other dealings with the Dutch East India Company, and with independent Chinese merchants. Satsuma Domain controlled relations with the Ryūkyū Kingdom (and through Ryūkyū, had access to Chinese goods and information, as well as products from further afield through alternative trade routes that passed through Ryūkyū), while Tsushima Domain handled diplomatic and trade relations with Joseon -dynasty Korea , and Matsumae Domain managed communications with

1056-588: The expense of the taxpaying citizens of Edo. For the latter part of Tsunayoshi's reign, he was advised by Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu . It was a golden era of classic Japanese art, known as the Genroku era . In 1701, Asano Naganori , the daimyō of Akō han, having been allegedly insulted by Kira Yoshinaka in Edo Castle , attempted to kill him. Asano was executed, but Kira went unpunished. Asano's forty-seven rōnin avenged his death by killing Kira and became

1100-458: The fact that Japan was not "closed" to the outside world, but was in fact very actively engaged with the outside world, albeit through a limited set of avenues. However, the measures Iemitsu enacted were so powerful that it was not until the 1850s that Japanese ports opened to a wider range of trading partners, Westerners were free to settle and travel within Japan, and Japanese were once more free to travel overseas. In 1643 Empress Meisho abdicated

1144-464: The forefront of shogunate negotiations with the Imperial court . Iemitsu ruled from 1623 to 1651; during this period he crucified Christians, expelled all Europeans from Japan and closed the borders of the country, a foreign politics policy that continued for over 200 years after its institution. Tokugawa Iemitsu was born on 12 August 1604. He was the eldest son of Tokugawa Hidetada and grandson of

1188-403: The heir to the Tokugawa shogunate. The only person to contest this position was his younger brother Tokugawa Tadanaga . A fierce rivalry began to develop between the brothers. From an early age Iemitsu practiced the shūdō tradition. However, in 1620, he had a falling out with his homosexual lover, Sakabe Gozaemon, a childhood friend and retainer, aged twenty-one, and murdered him as they shared

1232-407: The last great unifier of Japan, the first Tokugawa shōgun Tokugawa Ieyasu . He was the first member of the Tokugawa family born after Tokugawa Ieyasu became shōgun . (There was some rumour said that he was not Hidetada's son but Ieyasu's son with Kasuga no Tsubone ). Not much is known of Iemitsu's early life; his childhood name was Takechiyo (竹千代). He had two sisters, Senhime and Masako , and

1276-588: The later parts of his rule. In the 1690s and first decade of the 1700s, Tsunayoshi, who was born in the Year of the Dog, thought he should take several measures concerning dogs. A collection of edicts released daily, known as the Edicts on Compassion for Living Things ( 生類憐みの令 , Shōruiawareminorei ) , told the populace, among other things, to protect dogs, since in Edo there were many stray and diseased dogs walking around

1320-718: The local lord. The period domestic unrest is known as the Shimabara Rebellion . Thousands were killed in the shogunate's suppression of the revolt and countless more were executed afterwards. The fact that many of the rebels were Christians was used by the Bakufu as a convenient pretext for expelling the Portuguese and restricting the Dutch East India Company to Dejima in Nagasaki. Following

1364-567: The most popular foundational texts through to late imperial China. The text was used in elementary and moral education together with the Analects , Elementary Learning , and the Biographies of Exemplary Women . Study of the text was also mentioned in epitaphs as an indication of a person's good character. It was a practice to read aloud the text when mourning one's parents. The text was also important politically, partly because filial piety

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1408-492: The next shogun after Iemitsu's death, Tokugawa Ietsuna . Tsunayoshi was born in Edo and after his birth moved in with his mother to her own private apartments in Edo Castle . "The younger son (Tsunayoshi) apparently distinguished himself by his precociousness and liveliness at an early age, and the father, the third shogun, Iemitsu, became fearful that he might usurp the position of his duller elder brothers [and] thus he ordered that

1452-428: The opposite, relying on his remarkable mother for advice until her death. In 1651, shōgun Iemitsu died when Tsunayoshi was only five years old. His older brother, Tokugawa Ietsuna, became shogun. For the most part, Tsunayoshi's life during the reign of his brother shōgun Ietsuna is unknown, but he never advised his brother. In 1680, shōgun Ietsuna died at the premature age of 38. A power struggle ensued, and for

1496-576: The sayings, and formed the treatise." As the title suggests, the text elaborates on filial piety, which is a core Confucian value. The text argues that people who love and serve their parents will do the same for their rulers, leading to a harmonious society. For example, 資於事父以事母，而愛同；資於事父以事君，而敬同。 As they serve their fathers, so they serve their mothers, and they love them equally. As they serve their fathers, so they serve their rulers, and they reverence them equally. The Classic of Filial Piety occupied an important position in classical education as one of

1540-408: The throne. She was succeeded by her younger half-brother (Go-Mizunoo's son by a consort) Emperor Go-Kōmyō , who disliked the shogunate for its violent and barbaric ways. He repeatedly made insulting comments about Iemitsu and his eldest son and heir, Tokugawa Ietsuna . In 1651 shōgun Iemitsu died at the age of 47, being the first Tokugawa shōgun whose reign ended with death and not abdication. He

1584-423: The various daimyos, "Unlike my grandfather and father, it was decided from birth that I would become a shogun ." This is said to be based on the advice of Date Masamune . In 1626, shōgun Iemitsu and retired shōgun Hidetada visited Emperor Go-Mizunoo , Empress Masako (Hidetada's daughter and Iemitsu's sister), and Imperial Princess Meishō in Kyoto . Shōgun Iemitsu made lavish grants of gold and money to

1628-468: The winter of 1704. Ienobu was the son of his other brother, Tokugawa Tsunashige , the former Lord of Kōfu , which was a title Ienobu held himself before becoming shōgun . Ienobu moved into the official residence of Shogunal heir apparent at the Western Perimeter of Edo Castle . In 1706, Edo was hit by a typhoon, and Mount Fuji erupted the following year. It was insinuated that Tsunayoshi

1672-619: Was accorded a posthumous name of Taiyūin, also known as Daiyūin (大猷院) and buried in Taiyu-in Temple , Nikko. Iemitsu had expanded Nikkō Tōshō-gū prior to his death, but was careful to avoid iconography for his mausoleum that could be seen as surpassing that of his grandfather. He was succeeded by his eldest son and heir, Tokugawa Ietsuna . The years in which Iemitsu was shōgun are more specifically identified by more than one era name or nengō . Xiao Jing The Classic of Filial Piety , also known by its Chinese name as

1716-496: Was death. Japanese, who had since the 1590s traveled extensively in East and Southeast Asia (and, in rare instances, much farther afield), were now forbidden from leaving the country or returning, under pain of death. The edict offered lavish gifts and awards for anyone who could provide information about priests and their followers who secretly practiced and spread their religion across the country. Furthermore, every newly arrived ship

1760-470: Was postponed. Tsunayoshi and several of the ladies of the court sat behind reed screens, while the Dutch embassy sat in front of them. Tsunayoshi took an interest in Western matters, and apparently asked them to talk and sing with one another for him to see how Westerners behaved. Tsunayoshi later put on a Noh drama for them. Owing to religious fundamentalism, Tsunayoshi sought protection for living beings in

1804-431: Was required to be thoroughly examined for Catholic priests and followers. The document pays extremely close attention to every detail regarding incoming foreign ships. For example, merchants coming from abroad had to submit a list of the goods they were bringing with them before being granted permission to trade. Additional provisions specified details of the timing and logistics of trade. For example, one clause declares that

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1848-458: Was shogun are more specifically identified by more than one era name or nengō . Tokugawa Iemitsu Tokugawa Iemitsu (徳川 家光, August 12, 1604 – June 8, 1651) was the third shōgun of the Tokugawa dynasty . He was the eldest son of Tokugawa Hidetada with Oeyo , and the grandson of Tokugawa Ieyasu . Lady Kasuga was his wet nurse , who acted as his political adviser and was at

1892-632: Was stabbed by his consort after he tried to proclaim an illegitimate child as his heir; this concept, stemming from the Sanno Gaiki , is refuted in contemporary records which explain that Tsunayoshi had the measles at the end of his life and died on February 19, 1709, in the presence of his entourage. His death was just four days short of his 63rd birthday. He was given the Buddhist name Joken'in ( 常憲院 ) and buried in Kan'ei-ji . The years in which Tsunayoshi

1936-487: Was the first person to suggest that Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, as the brother of the former shōgun and the son of the third, become the next shōgun . Finally, in 1681 ( Tenna 1 ), Tsunayoshi's elevation was confirmed; and he was installed as the fifth shōgun of the Tokugawa shogunate. Immediately after becoming shōgun , Tsunayoshi gave Hotta Masatoshi the title of Tairō , in a way thanking him for ensuring his succession. Almost immediately after he became shogun, he ordered

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