The Tokugawa period, also known as the Edo period (1603-1868), was the last period in traditional Japan, a period of internal peace, political stability, and economic growth under the shogunate (military dictatorship) established by Ieyasu Tokugawa. When the Japanese society was ruled by the Tokugawa shogunate, was characterized by economic growth, strict social order, an isolationist foreign policy, and a stable population. Between 1853 and 1867, Japan ended its isolationist foreign policy and transitioned from the feudal Tokugawa shogunate to the pre-modern empire of the Meiji government.
From the late 12th century to the 17th century, Japan was ruled by samurai (military leaders), but politics remained volatile. Civil wars and changes of power were frequent, especially between the end of the 15th century and the end of the 16th century (the so-called Warring States period, or period of war).
Revolutions took place from the Kamakura shogunate period (which existed under the court of the king) to the Tokugawa period, when the samurai became the undisputed ruler of what historian Edwin O. Reischauer called a “centralized feudal” form of the shogunate. In 1867, two powerful Tokugawa rival clans, Choshu and Satsuma, joined forces to overthrow the shogunate, and the following year announced “Restoration of the Empire” in the name of the then 14-year-old young Emperor Meiji. In 1603, Ieyasu established a new government in Edo and became the first shogun of the Edo shogunate.
After the Battle of Sekihara in 1600 against another powerful warrior, Mitsunari Ishida, and other Western powers, Ieyasu Tokugawa gained the greatest power and wealth. Ultimately, the decisive battle of Sekihara (located between Nagoya and Kyoto, visible from the Shinkansen) in 1600 by Tokugawa Ieyasu and the attack on Osaka Castle in 1615, after the death of the rival Toyotomi family, unified the country.
The Tokugawa shogunate moved the political and military capital from Kyoto to Edo (modern day Tokyo) and ran a tightly controlled company for the next two hundred and fifty years. The Tokugawa Shogunate was a military government that ruled Japan for over 260 years from 1603 to 1868. The Tokugawa family ruled the country for the next 264 years (15 shoguns in total). During this period, Tokugawa Ieyasu established the government in Edo, the seat of today’s Japan’s central government.
The Edo period was a feudal society dominated by the soldier class (samurai) with the Grand Marshal or Shogun Tokugawa family who suppressed the barbarians as the core. The Edo period (also known as the Tokugawa period) refers to the period in Japanese history when Japan was under the rule of the Edo shogunate. Edo refers to a specific period in the country’s long history, and it’s also the ancient name for Japan’s capital, Tokyo.
Another view holds that the period started with the victory of Tokugawa Ieyasu at the Battle of Sekigahara and ended with the handover of Edo Castle, the government stronghold of the Edo shogunate, to the imperial army. But once the Tokugawa shogunate moved in, Edo became the center of political and cultural life, so much so that the period of Tokugawa rule is also known as the Edo period (1600-1868). This period ended with the Meiji Restoration on May 3, 1868, after the fall of Edo.
The Meiji Restoration was a series of events sparked by internal crises and strong anti-Western sentiments that ended the Edo period, which in turn ended the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and restored Japan to reality in 1868 under Emperor Meiji Imperial rule. Meiji Restoration The fall of Edo in 1868 marked the end of the Tokugawa shogunate and the beginning of the new Meiji era. The Meiji Revolution of 1868 ended Tokugawa’s rule and restored the power of the emperor.
The Tokugawa shogunate not only consolidated control over a unified Japan, but also wielded unprecedented power over the emperor, imperial court, all daimyo and religious order. As a shogun, Ieyasu achieved hegemony throughout the country by balancing the power of potentially hostile territories (tozama) with strategic allies (fudai) and small clans (chimpanzees). It contains 2 million landing stones, a new headquarters in Edo, a strategically located castle city (the future Tokyo), and also controls another 2 million landing stones and thirty-eight vassals.
As another control strategy, starting in 1635, Tokugawa Iemitsu required state lords, or daimyo, to maintain families in Tokugawa’s administrative capital of Edo (now Tokyo) and reside there for a few months every two years. In addition, during their return to their home regions, the wife and heir had to remain in Edo as “hostages”. The third Tokugawa shogun, Tokugawa Iemitsu (1623-51), introduced the sankin-kotai (“variable frequency”) system, according to which the daimyo had to have a residence in Edo and settle there every two years.
During the Edo period, the shogunate government relocated the princes (daimyo) aggressively, and it was also an era of active cultural exchanges throughout Japan. The Tokugawa shogunate brought peace to Japan, which brought prosperity to Japan, and the Edo period was characterized by many cultural events.
The Japanese Tokugawa (or Edo) period, which lasted from 1603 to 1867, was to be the last era of traditional Japanese government, culture, and society before the Meiji Restoration of 1868 overthrew the long-ruling Tokugawa shoguns and pushed the country into its modern state era. The Edo period (Jiang Hu Shi Dai, Edo jidai) or the Tokugawa period (De Chuan Shi Dai, Tokugawa jidai) is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the village.
The reason for the end of this period is debatable, but it states that US Navy Commodore Matthew Perry, whose army (known to the Japanese as the “black ships”), fired from Edo Bay, forced the opening of Japan to the world. Perry’s coal-fired ships set off a chain of events in politically unstable Japan that, fifteen years later, led to the overthrow of the Tokugawa shogunate and the return of power to the emperor. Although the Tokugawa shogunate had already begun to falter, the arrival of Perry’s heavily armed “black ships” marked the beginning of the end of the Edo period.