270px, Remnants of the walls of Kanō Castle was a '' fudai''

feudal domain A demesne ( ) or domain was all the land retained and managed by a lord of the manor under the feudal system for his own use, occupation, or support. This distinguished it from land sub-enfeoffed by him to others as sub-tenants. The concept or ...

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 ...

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 ...

. The domain was centered at

Kanō Castle Kanō Tenman-gū was a ''hirajirō''-style Japanese castle located in the city of Gifu, Gifu Prefecture, Japan. It was one of the few castles built after the Battle of Sekigahara and establishment of the Tokugawa shogunate and was used as an adm ...

, located in what is now part of the city of

Gifu is a city located in the south-central portion of Gifu Prefecture, Japan, and serves as the prefectural capital. The city has played an important role in Japan's history because of its location in the middle of the country. During the Sengoku ...

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 ...

History

Before the

Battle of Sekigahara The Battle of Sekigahara (Shinjitai: ; Kyūjitai: , Hepburn romanization: ''Sekigahara no Tatakai'') was a decisive battle on October 21, 1600 (Keichō 5, 15th day of the 9th month) in what is now Gifu prefecture, Japan, at the end of ...

, the central

Mino Province was a province of Japan in the area of Japan that is today southern Gifu Prefecture. Mino was bordered by Ōmi to the west, Echizen and Hida to the north, and Shinano to the east, and Ise, Mikawa, and Owari to the south. Its abbreviat ...

was ruled by

Oda Hidenobu , the son of Oda Nobutada, was a samurai who lived during the Azuchi-Momoyama period in the late-16th century. He was a convert to Catholicism. His other name was Sanbōshi (三法師). Succession dispute When Oda Nobutada and Oda Nobunaga, Hid ...

Oda Nobunaga was a Japanese ''daimyō'' and one of the leading figures of the Sengoku period. He is regarded as the first "Great Unifier" of Japan. Nobunaga was head of the very powerful Oda clan, and launched a war against other ''daimyō'' to unify ...

's grandson, from his base at

Gifu Castle is a Japanese castle located in the city of Gifu, Gifu Prefecture, Japan. Along with Mount Kinka and the Nagara River, it is one of the main symbols of the city. The castle is also known as . It was designated a National Historic Site in 2011 ...

. However, as Hidenobu sided with

Ishida Mitsunari Ishida Mitsunari (, 1559 – November 6, 1600) was a Japanese samurai and military commander of the late Sengoku period of Japan. He is probably best remembered as the commander of the Western army in the Battle of Sekigahara following the A ...

at the Battle of Sekigahara, his territory was confiscated by

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 ...

. In 1601, Ieyasu granted the area to his son-in-law

Okudaira Nobumasa called Okudaira Sadamasa (奥平貞昌), was a Japanese '' daimyō'' of the Sengoku and early Edo periods. Nobumasa's family considered their origins to have been associated with Mikawa Province. The clan was descended through the Akamatsu ...

. Okudaira Nobumasa was allowed to build

with materials from the dismantled Gifu Castle. This was the birth of the Kanō Domain. Nobumasa's placement at Kanō was meant to act as a check against the potentially hostile lords of western Japan, who might have wanted to march eastward against Ieyasu. Nobumasa retired in 1602, handing over the position of ''

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 ...

'' to his son Okudaira Tadamasa; however, he retained 40,000 of the domain's 100,000 ''

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 ...

'' as a "retirement fund", and continued to hold actual power, establishing a system of

flood control Flood control methods are used to reduce or prevent the detrimental effects of flood waters."Flood Control", MSN Encarta, 2008 (see below: Further reading). Flood relief methods are used to reduce the effects of flood waters or high water level ...

and aiding in the setup of the castletown. Nobumasa and Tadamasa died in quick succession; the third Okudaira lord of Kanō, Tadataka, died heirless in 1632, and so Okudaira rule in Kanō came to an end. Kanō was then given to the

Ōkubo clan The were a ''samurai'' kin group which rose to prominence in the Sengoku period and the Edo periods.Meyer, Eva-Maria"Gouverneure von Kyôto in der Edo-Zeit."Universität Tübingen (in German) Under the Tokugawa shogunate, the Ōkubo, as heredita ...

, with a reduced ''

kokudaka refers to a system for determining land value for taxation purposes under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo-period Japan, and expressing this value in terms of ''koku'' of rice. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"Koku"in ''Japan Encyclopedia'', p. 54 ...

'' of 50,000

from 1632-1639. Ōkubo Tadamoto was transferred from Kisai Domain in

Musashi Province was a province of Japan, which today comprises Tokyo Metropolis, most of Saitama Prefecture and part of Kanagawa Prefecture. It was sometimes called . The province encompassed Kawasaki and Yokohama. Musashi bordered on Kai, Kōzuke, Sagami, S ...

(which was dissolved as a result) and subsequently swapped places with the Matsudaira-Toda clan of

Akashi Domain was a feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in Harima Province in what is now the southern portion of modern-day Hyōgo Prefecture. It was centered around Akashi Castle, which is located in what is now the cit ...

Harima Province or Banshū (播州) was a province of Japan in the part of Honshū that is the southwestern part of present-day Hyōgo Prefecture. Harima bordered on Tajima, Tanba, Settsu, Bizen, and Mimasaka Provinces. Its capital was Himeji. During the ...

. Under the Toda (1639-1711), the domain had a rated ''kokudaka'' of 70,000 ''koku''. The Toda ruled until their transfer to

Yodo Domain The was a Japanese domain of the Edo period, and the only domain located in Yamashiro Province. Its castle was located within modern-day Fushimi, Kyoto. The strategic location of the castle figured in the 1582 Battle of Yamazaki. During the 1 ...

Yamashiro Province was a province of Japan, located in Kinai. It overlaps the southern part of modern Kyoto Prefecture on Honshū. Aliases include , the rare , and . It is classified as an upper province in the ''Engishiki''. Yamashiro Province included Kyoto its ...

in 1711. They were followed by the

Andō clan The is a Japanese samurai kin group. Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon''; Papinot, (2003).html" ;"title="DF 6 of 80">"Andō," ''Nobiliare du Japon'', p. 2 DF_6_o_...

_from_Bitchu-Matsuyama_Domain.html" ;"title="DF 6 of 80/nowiki>">DF 6 o ...

History

Bakumatsu period holdings

List of daimyō

References

External links