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The familial temple of Tokugawa Ieyasu, Zōjō-ji, as depicted by Hiroshige in 1857. Tokugawa Ieyasu was known for his devotion to the Jōdo-shū school of Buddhism throughout his life, having been born into the Matsudaira clan which followed Jōdō Buddhism.
- Overview
- Early life
- Leadership of the Tokugawa
- Conquest of the Hōjō
Tokugawa Ieyasu was separated from his parents at an early age. His mother was forced to leave the household because of shifting clan alliances, and, when he was four years old, Ieyasu was sent as a hostage to the Imagawa clan. En route, he was captured by the rival Oda family and held for two years.
Where did Tokugawa Ieyasu grow up?
Tokugawa Ieyasu spent his early life in Sumpu (now Shizuoka) as a hostage of the Imagawa clan. There he received military and leadership training and, by his teen years, was acting as a lieutenant for clan leader Imagawa Yoshimoto. Imagawa was slain when Ieyasu was 17, and Ieyasu returned to his family home near Nagoya.
What were Tokugawa Ieyasu’s achievements?
Tokugawa Ieyasu possessed a combination of organizational genius and military aptitude that allowed him to assert control of a unified Japan. As a result, his family presided over a period of peace, internal stability, and relative isolation from the outside world for more than 250 years.
Where is Tokugawa Ieyasu buried?
Ieyasu was born into the family of a local warrior situated several miles east of modern Nagoya, one of many such families struggling to survive in a brutal age of endemic civil strife. His childhood was scarcely auspicious. His father, Matsudaira Hirotada, was involved in a network of shifting alliances that repeatedly drew him into battle. When Ieyasu was two years old, his mother was permanently separated from his father’s family because of one such change in alliances, and in 1547 military adversity compelled his father to send him away as hostage to the Imagawa family, powerful neighbours headquartered at Sumpu (now the city of Shizuoka) to the east. However, members of the rival Oda clan to the west waylaid his entourage, and he was held for two years before being released to the Imagawa.
Conditions at Sumpu were more settled, and Ieyasu was trained in the military and governmental arts and developed a great love for falconry. In the late 1550s he took a wife, fathered the first of several sons, and began to acquire military experience by leading forces on behalf of Imagawa Yoshimoto, the clan leader. Despite his personal comfort, however, Ieyasu’s years at Sumpu had been worrisome ones. He had learned that his father had been murdered by a close vassal in 1549 (one of the events leading to his release by the Oda) and had observed helplessly from afar the subsequent disintegration of his family fortunes.
In 1560 Imagawa Yoshimoto was slain during a battle with Oda Nobunaga, who was rapidly gaining power, and young Ieyasu seized the opportunity to return to his family’s small castle and assume control of his surviving relatives and vassals. Within months he took steps to ally himself with Nobunaga, at the same time pacifying the new and inept leader of the Imagawa house long enough to recall his wife and son from Sumpu. Freed for a few years from warring with neighbours, he directed his military efforts to crushing rebellious Buddhist sectarian groups within the Matsudaira (after 1566, Tokugawa) domain. Concurrently, he devoted much energy to improving his small army’s command structure, appointing civil administrators, and formulating and enforcing procedures of taxation, law enforcement, and litigation.
During the later 1560s the Imagawa domain disintegrated, and Ieyasu expanded to the east as opportunity permitted. In 1570 this expansion led him to move his headquarters eastward to Hamamatsu, a small coastal town that he developed into the commercial and strategic centre of a thriving domain. Relying heavily on his alliance with the now-mighty Nobunaga, Ieyasu survived the vicissitudes of endemic war and slowly extended his territory until, by the early 1580s, he had become an important daimyo (feudal baron), in control of the fertile and populous area stretching from Okazaki eastward to the mountain barrier at Hakone.
In 1582 Nobunaga was wounded by a rebellious subordinate and committed suicide; Toyotomi Hideyoshi, his most brilliant general, quickly avenged the death and moved to assume Nobunaga’s preeminent political position. Ieyasu, then in the prime of life, emerged as his principal rival. After a few bloody but indecisive skirmishes, however, the cautious Ieyasu offered a vow of fealty, and Hideyoshi was content to leave Ieyasu’s domain intact. During the rest of the 1580s, while Hideyoshi busily extended his control over the daimyo of southwestern Japan, Ieyasu strengthened himself as best he could. He continued to enlarge his vassal force, increase his domain’s productivity, and improve the reliability of his administration. And in 1586, for greater security, he moved his headquarters even farther to the east, away from Hideyoshi, to Sumpu, the town he had known years before as a hostage.
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In 1589 Hideyoshi determined to obtain vows of subordination from the Hōjō daimyo, who held a large district east of the Hakone mountain barrier. When the Hōjō refused to submit, Hideyoshi and Ieyasu mobilized a great army and navy that blockaded the Hōjō forces in their seaside castle at Odawara. After a long and patient siege the Hōjō were starved into capitulation. At Hideyoshi’s suggestion Ieyasu then surrendered his coastal provinces west of Hakone in return for the Hōjō domain to the east. As rapidly as possible he moved thousands of vassals, their military equipment, and their households to the little fort and farmlands near the fishing village of Edo (modern Tokyo), nearly a month’s march from Hideyoshi’s headquarters near Kyōto.
During the 1590s Ieyasu, unlike several great daimyo from western Japan, avoided involvement in Hideyoshi’s two disastrous military expeditions to Korea. Instead, he grasped the opportunity afforded by his transfer to his new lands to deploy his forces rationally and to make his domain as secure as possible. He stationed his most powerful vassals on the perimeter of his territory and along main access routes, keeping the least powerful—and least dangerous to himself—nearer Edo.
He then placed large tracts of land close by the town under direct administration by appointed officials, thereby assuring his castle inhabitants easy access to the largest possible supply of foodstuffs, and made detailed land and property surveys in order to regularize taxation. He also confiscated the weapons of all villagers, thereby reducing the likelihood of peasant rebellion, and moved vigorously to attract skilled artisans and businessmen to his new castle town. He undertook engineering projects to enlarge his castle, facilitate urban growth, and assure a water supply for the town populace. When Hideyoshi died in 1598, Ieyasu had the largest, most reliable army and the most productive and best organized domain in all Japan.
Hideyoshi’s death precipitated another power struggle among the daimyo, and Ieyasu, as the most powerful and most respected of Hideyoshi’s former vassal advisers, became the head of one faction in that struggle. The armies assembled in the autumn of 1600 at Sekigahara, some 50 miles (80 km) northeast of Kyōto, and in the ensuing battle Ieyasu’s eastern army triumphed.
- Conrad D. Totman
Sep 1, 2022 · Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543-1616) was a Japanese military leader who reunified Japan at the beginning of the 17th century after a long period of civil war, known as the Warring States or Sengoku period. He created a new government controlled by the Tokugawa family that ruled Japan until 1868.
- Graham Squires
The Tokugawa shogunate was established by Tokugawa Ieyasu after victory at the Battle of Sekigahara, ending the civil wars of the Sengoku period following the collapse of the Ashikaga shogunate. Ieyasu became the shōgun, and the Tokugawa clan governed Japan from Edo Castle in the eastern city of Edo along with the daimyō lords of the samurai ...
Oct 29, 2009 · Learn about Tokugawa Ieyasu, the Japanese warlord who unified the country and founded the Tokugawa Shogunate. Find out how he defeated his rivals, allied with Nobunaga and Hideyoshi, and became a Buddhist avatar.
Tokugawa Ieyasu © One of the most significant figures in Japanese history, Ieyasu was a warrior, statesman and founder of the Tokugawa dynasty of shoguns. Tokugawa Ieyasu was...
Jul 7, 2020 · Learn how Tokugawa Ieyasu rose from a young boy sent as a hostage to a powerful daimyō who founded the Edo shogunate and ruled Japan for over 200 years. Explore his battles, alliances, reforms, and legacy in this article.
