The Tokugawa and the Emergence of
Modern Japan (1600-1868)
Teacher Resource Guide
East Asia National Resource Center
By Kelly Hammond
The Tokugawa The Tokugawa? The Tokugawa Regime?
The Tokugawa Period? The Tokugawa
Polity? The Tokugawa Bakufu? The
Tokugawa Shogunate? The Edo period?
With all these names floating around, it is
no wonder people get confused about the
period in Japanese history that scholars
usually describe as lasting from 1600 to
1868. “Tokugawa” is the clan name of the
family who managed to bring an end to a
period marked by continuous war and
destruction that plagued the Japanese
archipelago for centuries. The Tokugawa
family began the process of unifying Japan
into the modern polity that we imagine it
to be today. Following the disunity and
chaos of the Warring States Period, Oda
Nobunagu reestablished a centralized
government, but it was only after a
decisive battle in 1600 that the authority
of the state fell to Tokugawa Ieyasu (“EE-
eh-ya-su”). Tokugawa Ieyasu inherited
and expanded the political structures that
Oda Nobunagu had put into place. This
event marks the beginning of the
Tokugawa period and for the next 268
years a military-like government would
rule Japan with a Tokugawa clan member
at its head.
There were many changes to Japanese
society during the Tokugawa period. The
lasting peace meant that the population
grew, urbanization increased, and
infrastructure (e.g. roads and canals) and
communications improved. The period
was also accompanied by contentious
relationships with Qing China and
Western missionaries, indicating that
Japan constantly re-imagined its position
in the emerging global order of the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Before taking a closer look at some of
these changes to Japanese society, a few
more terms need to be explained and
defined.
Tokugawa Ieyasu, founder of the Tokugawa.
Edo and Tokugawa? Are They the Same?
Sometimes the Tokugawa period is
referred to as the “Edo period.” Edo (江戸),
which literally means “entrance to the bay”
or “estuary,” is the old name for Tokyo.
The Tokugawa clan established their
government—or the bakufu—in Edo.
Although Kyoto remained the official
capital, Edo became the de facto capital of
Tokugawa Japan and the center of
political power. Before this, Edo had been
a small village.
View of Edo Castle. Source: Castles of Japan
During the Tokugawa period, however, the
city grew to have about 1,000,000
inhabitants, rivaled only by Beijing for the
largest city in the world at the time. In
1868, Edo was renamed Tokyo, which
means “Eastern capital” (in relation to
Kyoto) and the emperor moved from
Kyoto to take up residence in Edo castle.
This is all to say that sometimes people
refer to the Tokugawa Period as the Edo
Period because it was during this time that
Edo rose to prominence as the center of
politics and social life in Japan. Tokyo
might not have become the global city that
it is today if the Tokugawa had not
established their de facto capital there in
1600.
Shogun? Bakufu? Daimyō? Samurai?
Translated into English, shōgun (将軍)
means “military commander” or
“generalissimo.” The shōgun was usually a
hereditary military leader of Japan
throughout the early modern period.
When Portuguese explorers arrived in
Japan, they described the relationship
between the emperor and the shōgun like
the one between the Roman Catholic Pope
(symbolic but little practical political
power) and a European King.
Map of regional breakdown of daimyo.
Source: Giant ITP
The shōgun’s office or their administration
is known as the bakufu (幕府), which
literally means "tent office." Sometimes
the bakufu is also called the “Shogunate”
in English. The tent originally symbolized
that the shōgun was a field commander
who often moved locations, thus
indicating that the position of office is
temporary. The shōgun’s officials were as
a collective the bakufu, and were those
who carried out the actual duties of
administration while the imperial court
retained only nominal authority. During
the Tokugawa Period, the effective power
of government rested with the Tokugawa
shōgun, not with the emperor who stayed
in Kyoto, even though the shōgun gained
his legitimacy by earning the emperor’s
official recognition. The shōgun controlled
foreign policy, the military, and the feudal
lords—or the daimyō.
Daimyō is a generic term referring to
powerful hereditary lords who ruled large
territories and clans in early modern
Japan. In the term “daimyo,” “dai (大)”
literally means “large” and the “myō”
stands for myōden (名田), meaning
“private land.” The daimyō of early
modern Japan are often compared to
powerful feudal lords who ruled kingdoms
in early modern Europe. Like feudal lords,
the daimyō were subordinate only to the
shōgun and the emperor.
Japanese Samurai in their traditional outfit.
Source: Journey to Orthodoxy
After the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600,
Tokugawa Ieyasu was recognized as
shōgun. He then reorganized roughly 200
daimyō based on their rice production
output and whether or not they had
supported the Tokugawa clan in their rise
to power. The Shogunate was never static
and power shifted constantly throughout
the Tokugawa period; each shōgun
encountered competition and challenges
to his authority. Daimyō often hired
samurai to guard their land and they paid
them in land or food. In contrast with
European feudal knights, samurai were
not landowners but the military nobility of
early modern Japan. Samurai came to
mean “someone who serves the nobility.”
During the Tokugawa period, the lasting
peace meant that samurai served less as
warriors but fulfilled more bureaucratic
and administrative roles.
The Tokugawa Bakufu and the
Policy of Alternate Attendance
Sankin-kōtai, or the policy of “alternate
attendance,” was a system established by
the Tokugawa that had all the daimyō
spend every other year at the Tokugawa
court in Edo and leave their family
members as “hostages” when they
returned to their lands. These “hostages”
were seen as a way of ensuring that the
daimyō would not rise in rebellion or do
anything against the wishes of the Shogun.
However, in reality, the hostages led very
normal and pleasant lives in the capital.
The daimyō of course, did not travel alone;
they brought large retinues numbering in
the hundreds and had to maintain
permanent staff in Edo as well as in their
homelands. Because the men brought very
few women with them to Edo (apart from
their wives and daughters, who were left
as hostages), the gender ratio in the
capital was extremely skewed, with almost
two men for every woman. This, in turn,
led to the establishment of brothels and
the expansion of courtesan culture. The
policy of Sankin-kōtai had numerous
other important impacts on Japanese
society; it increased the political control of
the Tokugawa shōgun over the daimyō as
they were forced to spend time away from
their lands and spend great deals of their
money to maintain a home at their castle
and in the capital; it increased the need for
roads and infrastructure between Edo and
the daimyō’s lands; and it also meant that
Edo would develop as a cultural center
around the many lords and their families
who now had to spend time in the capital
and had large incomes to spend on
entertainment, fashion, and food.
Samurai and the Story of the
Forty-Seven Ronin Samurai were the military nobility of early
modern Japan. By the end of the twelfth
century, samurai became almost entirely
synonymous with bushi, a word that was
closely associated with the middle and
upper echelons of the warrior class. The
idea of bushi originates from the samurai
moral code, stressing frugality, loyalty,
martial arts mastery, and honour. The
samurai followed a set of rules that came
to be known as bushidō—or the way of
bushi. While samurai numbered less than
10 percent of Japan's population in the
early modern era, samurai teachings can
still be found today in both everyday life
and in modern Japanese martial arts. The
philosophies of Buddhism and Zen, and to
a lesser extent Confucianism and Shinto,
influenced the samurai culture. Zen
meditation became an important teaching,
while Confucianism played an important
role in samurai philosophy by stressing
the importance of the lord-retainer
relationship, or the loyalty that a samurai
was required to show his feudal lord.
The Tokugawa clan seal. Source: Lemon-s
By the nineteenth century, there was a
paradoxical shift in the samurai culture; it
became more codified as an elite social
class, but also, their role as violent
warriors was cut-back by the Shogun who
was nervous about rebellion. When the
Tokugawa Bakufu forced the daimyō to
reduce the size of their armies, ronin
(浪人)—or master-less samurai—became a
large problem in Japanese society. One of
the most famous legends in Japan is the
story of the Forty-Seven Ronin, which
took place in the eighteenth century Japan.
The story tells of a group of ronin who
sought revenge for their lord after he was
forced to commit seppuku (ritual suicide).
Upon getting their revenge, the ronin were
captured and obliged to commit seppuku.
This true story gained a sort of mythical
quality within Japanese culture and the
Forty-Seven Ronin came to embody all the
virtues of a samurai: loyalty, sacrifice, and
honor.
Society and Culture in Tokugawa Japan During the Tokugawa period, Japan
experienced a new era of prosperity and
growth. The end of war period and the
establishment of the Tokugawa led to
quick expansion of the population, which
reached about 17 million people by 1650.
This growth was also facilitated by less
frequent epidemics and the introduction
of new, stronger rice strains. As the
population grew and economy improved,
commercial activities flourished,
connecting regions that had previously
been politically divided.
This growth in population also led to the
concentration of large numbers of people
in urban areas, which in turn led to the
growth of cities. Before, daimyō had lived
in walled castles, but wary of rebellion,
Tokugawa Ieyasu had redesigned castles
to have smaller walls and to be more open,
allowing more fluid flow of traffic and to
be less defensive structures. In tandem
with the increased agricultural output
owing to new types of grains, changes in
both urban and rural Japan contributed
substantially to the process of building a
strong state and an industrial economy in
the nineteenth century.
Illustration of Edo. Source: Museum of the City
In a way, then, the changes that happened
in Japanese society throughout the
Tokugawa period can be understood as
developments that led up to the Meiji
Restoration in 1868 rather than seeing the
Meiji Restoration as a rupture or a break
with the past (the Meiji Restoration will be
discussed in the next module).
Religion, Christianity, and
the Tokugawa Shogunate
Most Japanese people do not exclusively
identify themselves as adherents of a
single religion. Rather, they incorporate
elements of various religions in a syncretic
fashion known as Shinbutsu shugou or the
amalgamation of Shinto kamis and
Buddhism. Shinto and Japanese
Buddhism are therefore best understood
not as completely separate and competing
faiths, but as a multi-faceted and complex
religious system. This comprehensive
approach to religion suggests that
Japanese were often open and receptive to
new religious ideas, including Christianity.
When Christian missionaries from the
West first arrived in Japan, the Japanese,
compared to those in other parts of Asia,
were more open to the Christian teachings.
However, this did not last long as the
missionaries quickly began to manoeuvre
politically, much to the chagrin of the
Tokugawa shogun. After a few failed
attempts at banning Christianity, the
Tokugawa Shogunate crucified twenty-six
Christians—some of them Europeans and
some Japanese—and finally managed to
expel all the Western missionaries and
force the remaining Japanese Christians
underground.
During the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries, Japan was producing about
one-third of the world’s silver. Most of it
was heading to China in exchange for
luxury goods like silk and fine teas, but
when Europeans got wind of the fact that
there were large silver mines in Japan,
they began to reach out. In 1543, two
Portuguese ships arrived in Japan from
Macao, establishing trade relations with
the local daimyō and introducing the
locals to muskets. In the endemic warfare
of the time period, daimyō quickly realized
the value of these muskets and placed
large orders for them. Following right
behind the merchants were the
missionaries, who at first received a
relatively free reign and began converting
large numbers of Japanese to Christianity.
Initially, they were tolerated but soon after
they were expelled. It is likely that some of
the daimyō had become allied with some
powerful Jesuits and converted to
Christianity, so the shogun saw
Christianity as a threat to his political
order, not as some sort socio-religious
problem. In any case, the expulsion of the
Christians had a lasting impact not only
on the development of Japan as a nation,
but also on the way that Europeans wrote
about Japan. Until recently, this event was
seen as a “rejection” of the West and as the
“closing” of Japanese society to the world
during the Tokugawa and that society was
stagnant and non-changing.
Commodore Matthew Perry and
the Arrival of the “Black Ships”
Commodore Matthew C. Perry.
Source: U.S. Navy Museum
In 1853, Commodore Matthew Perry
arrived in Edo Bay with a number of war
ships and demanded that the Tokugawa
open trading ports to the Americans. He
left the Tokugawa with an ultimatum; he
would return in one year with more ships
and guns, and if the Japanese did not
concede to his demands, he would attack.
The Tokugawa shogun, aware of the
humiliation that the Chinese had suffered
in the Opium Wars with the British and
the subsequent treaties they had been
forced to sign, conceded to Perry’s
demands. In the past, this event was
explained by historians as “the opening” of
Japan after centuries of isolation and
stagnation. However, historians now
argue the idea that Tokugawa Japan was a
“closed” society is not a legitimate claim
and is rather a vestige of an out-dated way
of writing and thinking about history.
Japanese depiction of Perry.
Source: Brian Hoffert
Although the Tokugawa did take measures
to expel Europeans from Japan (apart
from a few Dutch) and completely quell
any sort of Christian influence, the idea
that they were completely shut off to the
outside world is out-dated, and frankly,
wrong. Through their connections with
the Dutch and other East Asian entities,
like Siam, China, and Korea, the
Tokugawa Shogunate had a good
understanding of the changes going on
around them and the events that were
shaping the early modern world.
Arrival of the West. Source: Library of Congress
In 1854, the Treaty of Peace and Amity
allowed the United States to begin trading
with Japan. Five years later, another act
was forced on the Japanese government to
open even more ports for trade with the
United States. While there were anti-
Western feelings among the Japanese
population, many people realized the
benefits of Western sciences and advanced
military technology. This led to division
within the country as different groups vied
to have their viewpoints heard about how
to approach modernization. In an attempt
to keep up with Western weapons and
defense, a naval training academy was
established in Nagasaki in 1855 under the
leadership of Dutch instructors. The
following year, a military school that
embraced Western ideas was launched in
Edo. By 1868, changes that had been set in
motion throughout the Tokugawa—and
perhaps expedited by Perry’s arrival in
Edo—led to the Meiji Restoration and the
effective end of the Tokugawa Shogunate.
We will explore these new developments
in the next module.
Useful Websites Accompaniment website for most popular college level textbook for teaching introductory courses for Modern Japan http://www.oup.com/us/companion.websites/9780195339222/ Narrative of the history of the Tokugawa period from Asian History, a reliable source for information about Asia on the Internet: http://asianhistory.about.com/od/japan/p/History-Tokugawa-Shogunate-Japan.htm A lesson about the different Shoguns and periods in the Tokugawa presented by a PhD student in Japanese history http://sakura-zen.blogspot.com/2011/01/lesson-in-history-shogunates-and.html A link to images from the Tokugawa period with good descriptions of the images, their sources and the context surrounding them http://www.artelino.com/articles/tokugawa_bakufu.asp List of all the Tokugawa Shoguns and their concubines and wives. http://www.lesleydowner.com/journalism/secrets-of-the-shoguns-harem/the-tokugawa-shoguns/ Short documentary about the Tokugawa Period http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjovMjPU9ug Five-part series about the Tokugawa Period http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQlxcz9U2x0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3V5gVLPEvI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOGyzGWW7j4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRrDg0uDJWQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vHvmA
VSyUI History of the Tokugawa (Edo) Period hosted by the Government of Japan http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2128.html Art from the Tokugawa (Edo) Period presented by the Metropolitan Museum of Art http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/edop/hd_edop.htm Art from the Tokugawa (Edo) Period presented by the Honolulu Museum of Fine Art http://honolulumuseum.org/art/exhibitions/11649-edos_zagat_guide_hiroshiges_grand_series_famous_tea_houses Anatomical and Scientific Illustrations from the Tokugawa Period showing medical methods before and after the arrival of Europeans http://pasolininuc.blogspot.com/2013/02/anatomical-illustrations-from-edo.html Great Maps of Japan—searchable and great ability to zoom http://www.bigmapblog.com/2012/japanese-map-of-tokyo-bay-1852/ Blog about women and material culture in late Tokugawa Japan http://www.tokyoedoradio.org/Project/Links/edoCombs/edoCombs.html Explaination and description of state and society in the Edo Period http://www.grips.ac.jp/teacher/oono/hp/lecture_J/lec02.htm Information about individual samurai and samurai culture in general http://www.samurai-archives.com/edo.html Interesting and thoughtful module hosted by the Asian education program at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco http://education.asianart.org/explore-resources/background-information/edo-period-1615-1868-culture-and-lifestyle
Faculty posting about the decline of the Tokugawa http://bhoffert.faculty.noctrl.edu/HST263/15.TokugawaDecline.html Naval Documents from the US Navy website of Commodore Perry’s visits to Edo http://www.history.navy.mil/library/special/perry_openjapan1.htm
Suggestions for Further Reading
Ambros, Barbara and Duncan Williams, eds.
Local Religion in Tokugawa History. Nagoya: Nanzan Institute of Religion and Culture, 2001.
Ambros, Barbara. Emplacing the Pigrimage:
The Oyama Cult and Regional Religion in Early Modern Japan. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008.
Benedict, Ruth. The Chrysanthemum and the
Sword. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1989. Berry, Mary Elizabeth. Japan in Print:
Information and Nation in the Early Modern Period. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007.
Boxer, Charles. The Christian Century in
Japan, 1549-1650. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967.
Brown, Phillp C. Central Authority and Local
Autonomy in the Formation of Early Modern Japan: The Case of Kaga Domain. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993.
Davis, Julie Nelson. Utamoro and the
Spectacle of Beauty. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2007.
Dower, John with Timothy S. George.
Japanese History and Culture from Ancient to Modern Times: Seven Basic Bibliographies. Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers, 1995 (Second Edition).
Farris, William Wayne. Japan’s Medieval
Population: Famine, Fertility, and
Warfare in a Transformative Age. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2006
Ferejohn, John A. and Frances McCall
Rosenbluth, eds. War and State Buildng in Medieval Japan. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2010.
Friday, Karl, ed. Japan Emerging: Premodern
History to 1850. New York: Westview Press, 2012.
Goodman, Grant. The Dutch Impact on
Japan, 1640-1853. Leiden: Brill, 1967. Gordon, Andrew. A Modern History of Japan:
From Tokugawa Times to the Present. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009 (Second Edition).
Gramlich-Oka, Bettina, and Gregory Smits,
eds. Economic Thought in Early Modern Japan. Leiden: Brill, 2010.
Guth, Christine. Art of Edo Japan: The Artist
and the City, 1616-1868. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
Hellyer, Robert. Defining Engagement: Japan
and Global Contexts, 1640-1868. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009.
Hurst, Cameron G. III. Armed Martial Arts of
Japan. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.
Jansen, Marius B. China and the Tokugawa
World. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992.
Jansen, Marius B. The Making of Modern
Japan. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000.
Katsu Kokichi. Masui’s Story: The
Autobiography of a Tokugawa Samurai. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1993.
Maruyama Masao. Studies in the Intellectual
History of Tokugawa Japan. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1974.
McClain, James L. A Modern History: Japan.
New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2002.
McCLain, James L. and Osamu Wakita, eds. Osaka: The Merchants’ Capital of Early Modern Japan. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999.
Moran, J.F. The Japanese and the Jesuits:
Alessandro Valignano in Sixteenth-Century Japan. New York: Routledge, 1993.
Nakane Chie and Oishi Shinzaburo, eds.
Tokugawa Japan: The Social and Economic Antecedents of Modern Japan. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1990.
Nosco, Peter, ed. Confucianism and
Tokugawa Culture. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984.
Ooms, Herman. Tokugawa Village Practice:
Class, Status, Power, Law. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996.
Perez, Louis G. Daily Life in Early Modern
Japan. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2002.
Ravina, Mark. Land and Lordship in Early
Modern Japan. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999.
Rubinger, Richard. Popular Literacy in Early
Modern Japan. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2007.
Ruch, Barbara, ed. Engendering Faith:
Women and Buddhism in Premodern Japan. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002.
Toby, Roland. State and Diplomacy in Early
Modern Japan: Asia in the Development of the Tokugawa Bakufu. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984.
Totman, Conrad. Politics in the Tokugawa
Bakufu, 1600-1843. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967.
Totman, Conrad. The Collapse of the
Tokugawa Bakufu, 1862-1868. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1980.
Vaporis, Constantine N. Tour of Duty:
Samurai, Military Service in Edo, and the Culture of Early Modern Japan.
Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008.
Whelan, Christal. The Beginning of Heaven
and Earth: The Sacred Book of Japan’s Hidden Christians. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1996.