Dr. Vess's World Civilization Virtual Library

Tokugawa Japan

1600-1868

objectives:

1. Be able to trace the rise of the Tokugawa Shogunate in the late 16th and early 17th centuries.
2. Be able to discuss the structure of the Tokugawa government and to explain aspects of centralization and aspects of decentralization of politics during this period.
3. Be able to compare and contrast Tokugawa politics with the feudalism of the western Middle Ages.
4. Be able to discuss the art of the samurai and his role in Japanese society.
5. Be able to discuss the major artistic forms of expression during the Tokugawa period.
6. Be able to discuss the literature of Ihara Saikaku and its theses concerning Tokugawa society.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT:

The Tokugawa effectively united Japan for the first time in a social order reminiscent of that of medieval Europe. The sword came to symbolize the dominance of the art of war in this period. Forging a united government based on elements of Confucianism and Shinto, the Tokugawa shoguns and their samurai ruled with an iron fist.
Despite the rigid authoritarianism of Tokugawa society, the Japanese arts flourished. Japanese poets had a gift for expressing the ultimate mysteries of the universe in three short lines, while the bunraku and kabuki theaters explored the human dimension of the rigid code of ethics demanded by the state.
Quotations:

I need not mention how troublesome, evil, turbulent a country China is. To mention just one instance -- there is the matter of their picture writing. Japanese poetry has as its subject the human heart. It may seem to be of no practical use and just as well left uncomposed, but when one knows poetry well, one understands also without explanation the reasons governing order and disorder in the world.
Kamo Mabuchi (1697-1769), Writings
The business of the samurai consists in reflecting on his own station in life, in discharging loyal service to his master if he has one, in deepening his fidelity in association with friends, and, with due consideration of his own position, in devoting himself to duty above all.
Yamaga Soko (1622-1685), The Way of the Samurai
Such stillness-
The cries of the cicadas
Sink into the rocks.
An old pond-
A frog leaping in-
The sound of water.
A rough sea!
Stretched out over Sado
The Milky Way.
Matsuo Basho (1644-1694)
Heaven says nothing, and the whole earth grows rich beneath its silent rule. Men, too, are touched by heaven's virtue; yet, in their greater part, they are creatures of deceit. They are born, it seems, with an emptiness of soul, and must take their qualities wholly from things without. To be born thus empty into this modern age, this mixture of good and ill, and yet to steer through life on an honest course to the splendor of success -- this is a feat reserved for paragons of our kind, a task beyond the nature of the normal man.
Ihara Saikaku (1642-1693), The Japanese Family Storehouse, or The Millionaire's Gospel
OUTLINE

I. The Warring States (1467-1600)

A. The Ashikaga

B. The Foot Soldier Revolution

C. New Weapons:

i. the spear

ii. The impact of the Age of Discovery on Japan: the Portuguese and the musket

II. Hideyoshi

A. Vermillion seal trade with China

B. The disarming of the peasantry in 1588

C. freezing of social classes

D. surveys and standardization of measurement

III. Ieyasu Tokugawa

A. The battle of Sekigahara -- 1600 Film: "Japan in the Age of the Shoguns"

B. The bakufu domain system The Yin and Yang of political control:

i. centralization and decentralization of the bakufu

a. The Shogun: the emperor's military chief of staff the emperor's palace in Kyoto

b. The Daimyo:

i. the methods of controlling daimyos

a). the march to Edo every year

b). the Inns of the Shoguns

c). the family as hostage

d). restrictions on castle fortifications marriage

c.. the samurai:

i. the sword became the exclusive mark of the samurai

ii. film "Living Treasures of Japan" techniques of making a samurai sword

iii. the sword as an expression of Shinto bushido and Confucian ethics

iv. Lord Asano and his 47 samurai

v. seppuko (hari kiri)

C. Japan and the West: the Dutch traders the Jesuits:

i. After 1616, missionaries killed or expelled

ii. converts executed or forced to recant

iii. all westerners expelled after 1638 iv. Japanese were forbidden to go abroad v. contact with the west reopened after Commodore Matthew Perry's expedition in 1853.

IV. Japanese Culture:

A. bunraku plays: "Living Treasures of Japan"

i. Chikamatsu and his themes: the conflict between duty and human feelings

B. Kabuki plays

i. from "slanted" or "inclined"

ii. onnagata

C. the floating cities

D. Japanese woodcuts:

i. the artist Hokusai: Thirty Six Views of Mount Fuji

E. the literary work of Ihara Saikaku

F. haiku

Imperial Palace, Japan