Episode 526 - The Outside World and Tokugawa Japan

Unknown Speaker
Sometimes I could not sleep until dawn or I was kept from eating by these people. Japanese people respect our writing as though we were gods and keep them as treasure. Even a miserable palanquin bearer is happy to have a Chinese character written on a piece of paper by a Korean envoy. If you’re wondering, Shin was not equally impressed with the Japanese as they apparently were with him. In particular, he was deeply disturbed by the rarity of formal worship of Confucius. Confucian temples honoring the Great Sage are common in Korea and China, but Confucius’ worship, just like Confucius himself, never developed as big a following in Japan as it did On the mainland. He did, however, remark at the material prosperity of Osaka and especially Edo, as well as the numerous villages he visited along the way. A true Confucian, Shin expressed disdain at all this distracting material wealth, but was forced to admit that Japan’s people appeared to be well off. One might be tempted to conclude here that relations were friendly between the two powers, and that’s true in a sense, but it would also be a bit disingenuous to just leave it there.

Unknown Speaker
There would be Ainu rebellions against the Matsumaya system, most notably the rebellion of Shakshain in 1669, who rallied some 30,000 Ainu to his cause. However, those revolts met with little success. Shakshayan had numbers, but the Matsumai samurai had better training, weapons, and armor, and reinforcements from the mainland. Shakshayan himself was forced to surrender before too long, and within a year, he was killed by drunk Matsumai samurai out for revenge. After that rebellion, Matsumaya would begin to clamp down even harder on the Ainu population, banning the sale of edged metal tools, potential weapons in other words, and the learning Of the Japanese language by the Ainu, which would allow them to circumvent the Matsumaya trade monopoly.

Unknown Speaker
That factory actually moved around a few different times before settling in Nagasaki, and specifically an artificial island called Dejima constructed in Nagasaki’s harbor. Remember, Nagasaki was one of the cities controlled directly by the Tokugawa bakfu, so locating the Dutch outpost in that city was a way of ensuring the shogunate controlled the Dutch Trade. Part of the reason for this was, of course, wealth. The Dutch trade had both a substantial value attached to it, as a vehicle for yet more smuggled Chinese goods, and as a conduit for European-made technology and goods into the country. But far more important to the shogunate was information. The Dutch trade was the main method for the shogunate to remain aware of what was happening outside of Japan and especially outside East Asia. In particular, the head of the Dutch personnel stationed at Nagasaki, the Oeperhoeft, or Upper Headman, was required to come regularly to Edo to attend upon the Shogun, just like the Daimyo with the San King Koutai system we talked about in previous episodes. Partially the goal here was political theater. It reflected well on the prestige of the Shogunate if the emissaries of even an overseas power like the Netherlands came to perform homage to him. But largely the goal was to gather intelligence. The shogun and his advisors would often grill the Dutch on events outside of Japan, a way to keep up with goings-on in the wider world