- Tokugawa Ieyoshi
Tokugawa Ieyoshi (徳川 家慶,
June 22 ,1793 –July 27 ,1853 ; r.1837–1853) was the 12thshogun of theTokugawa shogunate ofJapan .He was the second son of the 11th shogun,
Tokugawa Ienari , and employedMizuno Tadakuni to conduct theTenpo reform .Ieyoshi was utterly surprised and unprepared upon receiving word of the arrival of Matthew Perry's ships in Edo Bay. ["The American naval expedition planners did have the forethought to incorporate reference material written by men whose published accounts of Japan were based on first-hand experience. J.W. Spaulding brought with him books by Japanologists
Engelbert Kaempfer ,Carl Peter Thunberg , andIsaac Titsingh ." Screech, T. (2006). "Secret Memoirs of the Shoguns: Isaac Titsingh and Japan, 1779-1822," p.73.] Whether from shock or from some other cause, Shogun Ieyoshi soon began to feel very sick and died shortly afterwards.In Popular Culture
Tokugawa Ieyoshi is a minor character in
Stephen Sondheim 's musical "Pacific Overtures ," in which he is murdered by his mother, using poisonedchrysanthemum tea .He is also a minor character in the first two
Nemuri Kyoshiro made-for-TV specials starringTamura Masakazu .Eras of Ieyoshi's "bakufu"
The years in which Ieyoshi was shogun are more specifically identified by more than one era name or "
nengō ".
* "Tenpō" (1830-1844)
* "Kōka " (1844-1848)
* "Kaei " (1848-1854)Notes
References
* Screech, Timon. (2006). "Secret Memoirs of the Shoguns: Isaac Titsingh and Japan, 1779-1822." London:
RoutledgeCurzon . ISBN 0-7007-1720-X
*Totman, Conrad. (1967). "Politics in the Tokugawa bakufu, 1600-1843". Cambridge:Harvard University Press .External links
* National Archives of Japan: [http://jpimg.digital.archives.go.jp/kouseisai/category/emaki/nikkodochuezu_e.html Illustrations of Road to Nikko, "Tempo" 14 (1843)]
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