260px, site of Imasu-juku was the fifty-ninth of the sixty-nine stations of the Nakasendō 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 in Edo period Japan. It is located in former Mino Province in what is now part of the town of Sekigahara, Fuwa District,

Gifu Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshu. Gifu Prefecture has a population of 1,991,390 () and has a geographic area of . Gifu Prefecture borders Toyama Prefecture to the north; Ishikawa Prefecture to the northwest, F ...

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

Imasu-juku was located on the ancient Tōsandō highway connecting the capital of

Heian-kyō Heian-kyō was one of several former names for the city now known as Kyoto. It was the official capital of Japan for over one thousand years, from 794 to 1868 with an interruption in 1180. Emperor Kanmu established it as the capital in 794, mov ...

with the provinces of eastern Japan, and near the border of Ōmi Province with Mino Province. In the early Edo period, the system of post stations on the Nakasendō was formalized by the Tokugawa shogunate in 1602, and it was a stopping place for traveling merchants () who originated from Ōmi Province. It was also on the ''

sankin-kōtai ''Sankin-kōtai'' ( ja, 参覲交代/参覲交替, now commonly written as ja, 参勤交代/参勤交替, lit=alternate attendance, label=none) was a policy of the Tokugawa shogunate during most of the Edo period of Japanese history.Jansen, M ...

'' route used by various western '' daimyō'' to-and-from the Shogun's court in

. It was also on the Kurihangaidō (九里半街道),Nakasendo Imasu-juku
. Ibisoku Co., Ltd. Accessed July 11, 2007. a trade road that connected the northwestern shores of Lake Biwa with Obama.Kurihangaidō
t.keiko. Accessed July 13, 2007. Imasu is 447 kilometers from

. Nearby Sekigahara Pass has some of the heaviest snowfalls in Japan, and travelers trapped by early snowfall in autumn were forced to spend time at Imazu until the road became passable. Per the 1843 guidebook issued by the , the town had a population of 1784 people in 464 houses, including one ''

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 ...

'', two ''waki-honjin,'' and 13 ''

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 ...

''. Following the Meiji restoration, traffic on the Nakasendō all but disappeared; prices increased and in 1869 after a bad harvest, the peasants around Imazu rose in revolt, demanding debt cancellation and the release of stored rice to avoid famine. The station official appealed to Ōgaki Domain, which sent troops to suppress the uprising by force. This was an indication of how Imasu-juku, once quite prosperous, had declined. Sekigahara Guide
/ref>

Imasu-juku in ''The Sixty-nine Stations of the Kiso Kaidō''

Utagawa Hiroshige's '' ukiyo-e'' print of Imasu-juku dates from 1835 -1838. The print emphasizes the location by depicting a border post proclaiming "Mino-Ōmi border". A traveller stops to read this inscription while another gets a light for his pipe from a man seated in front of a teahouse. Above him is a sign promoting “bien Sennjoko”, a cosmetic produced by the patron who subsidized this print series. Farther down the road is a man with two barrels wrapped in straw suspended by a pole over his shoulder, and there are shops for traveller's necessities, such as straw hats and sandals. Several travellers also arriving from the other direction, indicating the busy nature of this post station. In the plains below, crops have been harvested, indicating that the setting is autumn.

Neighboring post towns

;Nakasendō :

Sekigahara-juku was the fifty-eighth of the sixty-nine stations of the Nakasendō connecting Edo with Kyoto in Edo period Japan. It is located in former Mino Province in what is now part of the town of Sekigahara, Fuwa District, Gifu Prefecture, Japan. H ...

- Imasu-juku - Kashiwabara-juku

Notes

References

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External links

Hiroshige Kiso-Kaido seriesImasu-juku on Kiso Kaido RoadGifu Nakasendo Guide
{{Nakasendō Stations of the Nakasendō Post stations in Gifu Prefecture Sekigahara, Gifu Mino Province