was the tenth of the sixty-nine stations of the

Nakasendō The , also called the ,Richard Lane, ''Images from the Floating World'' (1978) Chartwell, Secaucus ; pg. 285 was one of the five routes of the Edo period, and one of the two that connected Edo (modern-day Tokyo) to Kyoto in Japan. There were 6 ...

highway connecting

Edo Edo ( ja, , , "bay-entrance" or "estuary"), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo. Edo, formerly a ''jōkamachi'' (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the ''de facto'' capital of ...

with

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

during the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional '' daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characteriz ...

. It was the largest of the stations in terms of population and number of buildings. It was located in the present-day city of Honjō,

Saitama Prefecture is a landlocked prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Saitama Prefecture has a population of 7,338,536 (1 January 2020) and has a geographic area of 3,797 km2 (1,466 sq mi). Saitama Prefecture borders Tochigi Prefecture ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

History

Honjō was the site of Honjō Castle, the stronghold of the

Honjō clan Honjō or Honjo may refer to: Places * Honjō, Akita * Honjō, Nagano * Honjō, Ōita * Honjō, Saitama * Honjo, Tokyo * Honjo Stadium * Honjo, Yutaro People * , Japanese samurai * , Japanese general *, Japanese immunologist Fictional characters ...

since the

Kamakura period The is a period of Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura by the first ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo after the conclusion of the Genpei War, which saw the struggle bet ...

. The Honjō were destroyed by

Toyotomi Hideyoshi , otherwise known as and , was a Japanese samurai and ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) of the late Sengoku period regarded as the second "Great Unifier" of Japan.Richard Holmes, The World Atlas of Warfare: Military Innovations that Changed the Cour ...

in 1590, and the territory came under the control of

Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and first ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa Shogunate of Japan, which ruled Japan from 1603 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. He was one of the three "Great Unifiers" of Japan, along with his former lord Oda Nobunaga and fellow ...

, who established in 10,000 ''

koku The is a Chinese-based Japanese unit of volume. 1 koku is equivalent to 10 or approximately , or about . It converts, in turn, to 100 shō and 1000 gō. One ''gō'' is the volume of the "rice cup", the plastic measuring cup that is supplied ...

'' Honjō Domain, which was ruled by the

Ogasawara clan The was a Japanese samurai clan descended from the Seiwa Genji.Papinot, Jacques. (2003)''Nobiliare du Japon'' – Ogasawara, pp. 44–45 Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon.'' (in Fren ...

from 1698 to 1612. A ''

honjin The ''honjin'' at Inaba Kaidō's Ōhara-shuku.">Ōhara-shuku.html" ;"title="Inaba Kaidō's Ōhara-shuku">Inaba Kaidō's Ōhara-shuku. is the Japanese word for an inn for government officials, generally located in post stations (''shukuba'') dur ...

'' was built near the site of the old castle in the northern part of the

castle town A castle town is a settlement built adjacent to or surrounding a castle. Castle towns were common in Medieval Europe. Some examples include small towns like Alnwick and Arundel, which are still dominated by their castles. In Western Europe, ...

, which quickly redeveloped itself into a ''

shukuba were post stations during the Edo period in Japan, generally located on one of the Edo Five Routes or one of its sub-routes. They were also called ''shuku-eki'' (宿駅). These post stations (or "post towns") were places where travelers could r ...

''. Due to the number of travelers, a second ''honjin'' was built at the opposite end of town in 1792. Per an 1843 guidebook issued by the , the town stretched for about 1.9 kilometers along the highway, with a population of 4554, with 1212 shops. The town boasted two very large scale ''

'', two ''waki-honjin,'' 475 ''

hatago were Edo period lodgings for travelers at '' shukuba'' (post stations) along the national highways, including the Edo Five Routes The , sometimes translated as "Five Highways", were the five centrally administered routes, or ''kaidō'', that ...

'', as well as 54 establishments whose attraction was primarily ''

meshimori onna or , literally "meal-serving woman," is the Japanese term for the women who were hired by ''hatago'' inns at the '' shukuba'' (post stations) along ''kaidō'' routes in Japan during the Edo era. They were originally maidservants hired by the inn ...

''. Honjō-shuku was approximately 22 ''ri'' from the starting point of the

at Nihonbashi, and was the last stop in Musashi Province. Very little evidence of the ''shukuba'' remains in the modern city of Honjō,Nakasendō Kaze no Tabi: Michi Annai
. Terebi Saitama. Accessed August 23, 2007. but the gate of the first ''honjin'', the Tamura Honjin, remains. On the site of the ''honjin'' itself, a police station was built in 1883 in the western-style of architecture of the

Meiji period The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization ...

. This too has been preserved as a local history museum.

Honjō-shuku in ''The Sixty-nine Stations of the Kiso Kaidō''

Keisai Eisen Keisai Eisen (渓斎英泉, 1790–1848) was a Japanese ''ukiyo-e'' artist who specialised in ''bijin-ga'' (pictures of beautiful women). His best works, including his ''ōkubi-e'' ("large head pictures"), are considered to be masterpieces of th ...

's ''

ukiyo-e Ukiyo-e is a genre of Japanese art which flourished from the 17th through 19th centuries. Its artists produced woodblock prints and paintings Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surfac ...

'' print of Honjō-shuku dates from 1835–1838. The print depicts the crossing of the Kanna River which marks the border between Musashi and

Kōzuke Province was a province of Japan in the area of Japan that is today Gunma Prefecture. Kōzuke bordered by Echigo, Shinano, Musashi and Shimotsuke Provinces. Its abbreviated form name was . Under the ''Engishiki'' classification system, Kōzuke was ran ...

s. The time is dusk, and a ''

daimyō were powerful Japanese magnates, feudal lords who, from the 10th century to the early Meiji era, Meiji period in the middle 19th century, ruled most of Japan from their vast, hereditary land holdings. They were subordinate to the shogun and n ...

'' procession with a closed

palanquin The litter is a class of wheelless vehicles, a type of human-powered transport, for the transport of people. Smaller litters may take the form of open chairs or beds carried by two or more carriers, some being enclosed for protection from the el ...

is crossing a bridge, which only extends to a sand bank halfway across the river. As part of the

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Tokugawa-jidai''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia ...

's security precautions, the deeper part of the river is not bridged, but must be crossed by ferry. Large stone lanterns mark the crossing point. In the distance are the mountains of

Mount Akagi is a mountain in Gunma Prefecture, Japan. The broad, low dominantly andesitic stratovolcano rises above the northern end of the Kanto Plain. It contains an elliptical, 3 x 4 km summit caldera with post-caldera lava domes arranged along a N ...

Mount Haruna is a dormant stratovolcano in Gunma, eastern Honshū, Japan. Outline Mount Haruna started to form more than 300,000 years ago and the last known eruption was 550 AD. The volcano has a summit caldera containing the symmetrical cinder cone ...

and

Mount Myōgi is one of the major mountains in Gunma Prefecture, Japan. Its straddles the border between the municipalities of Annaka, Shimonita and Tomioka. Well known for its rocks weathered into fantastic forms, this famous peak is ranked among Japan's th ...

. The village on the other side of the river is the next ''shukuba'' of the Nakasendō,

Shinmachi-shuku was the eleventh of the sixty-nine stations of the Nakasendō. It is located in the present-day city of Takasaki, Gunma Prefecture, Japan. History Though Shinmachi-shuku is the eleventh post station on the Nakasendō, it was the last station to ...

Neighboring post towns

;Nakasendō :

Fukaya-shuku was the ninth of the sixty-nine stations of the Nakasendō highway connecting Edo with Kyoto during the Edo periodShinmachi-shuku was the eleventh of the sixty-nine stations of the Nakasendō. It is located in the present-day city of Takasaki, Gunma Prefecture, Japan. History Though Shinmachi-shuku is the eleventh post station on the Nakasendō, it was the last station to ...

References

External links

Hiroshige Kiso-Kaido serieson Kiso Kaido Road

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Honjo-shuku Stations of the Nakasendō Stations of the Nakasendō in Saitama Prefecture Musashi Province