Tokugawa Period&

The Meiji Restoration

World HistoryUnit 3: Japan

ESSENTIAL QUESTION: How did Japan transform from feudalism to a modern nation in the 19th century. 

LEARNING OBJECTIVE: Examine how Japan went from warring states to a unified nation and eventually

isolated itself from the world. 

UNIFIED JAPAN

• For years warring states prevented unification

• Toyotomi Hideyoshi, a strong general, unified Japan in 1590

• After his death there was a struggle for power

TOKUGAWA IEYASU

• Starting in 1603, he created a shogunate that lasted until 1868

• He solidified his power against Toyotomi loyalists with a victory during the Summer Siege of Osaka in 1615

TOKUGAWA

• He and Hideyoshi are consider two of the greatest leaders of feudal Japan

• He forced the daimyos to live at the new capital city of Edo (eventually it becomes Tokyo)

TOKUGAWA

• Tokugawa regime was focused on reestablishing order in social, political, and international affairs

• His successors bound all daimyos to the shogunate and limited their power/land

• Only four social classes:– Warriors, peasants, artisans, merchants (tradesmen)

Japan: Memoirs of Secret Empire

• The Will of the Shogun

TOKUGAWA

• During the Tokugawa Shogunate there was relative peace

• Leaders were able to focus on creating roads, cities, banks and schools

• Agriculture, commerce and manufacturing, and the merchant class all increased

• Rise in Kabuki theater and Bunraku puppet theater

ISOLATION

• The leaders did not like foreigners and missionaries coming into their country

• Ban on Christianity (about 300,000 in Japan)• Forced underground

• Main religion was Shinto and the main philosophy was Confucianism

ISOLATION• Trade with Western nations was forbidden

• 1635 – Act of Seclusion no one allowed in or out• If a person left he/she would not be allowed to return• Exception: Small Dutch outpost in Nagasaki Harbor

• Isolation lasted for 200 years

• Japan did still trade with Korea and China!

The End of Isolation

• In 1853, Commodore Matthew Perry arrived at Edo Bay on a steamboat

• The Japanese had never seem something like this before and quickly realized their country could not defend themselves against foreign powers

• Japan & the U.S. set up a trade agreement

Arrival of the West

The End of Isolation

• This led to the rise in the importance of the merchant class

• Agriculture was lagging behind mercantile and commercial sectors unrest in the general population

Meiji Restoration • 1867 Choshu and Satsuma clans combined

forces to topple the shogunate

• In 1868 they declared an “imperial restoration” in the name of the young Emperor Meiji– He was 14 years old

Meiji Restoration

• Changes:– Feudalism and the samurai abolished– Established a constitutional monarchy– Rapid modernization– Built up their military strength – Opened to Western trade

Meiji Restoration

• The Meiji Period lasted until 1912 (death of Emperor Meiji)

• However, by this time Japan was one of the top five nations in the world!

SAYONARA

For now…