The of 1612 refers to the exposure of the intrigues involving the

Japanese Christian Christianity in Japan is among the nation's minority religions in terms of individuals who state an explicit affiliation or faith. Between less than 1 percent and 1.5% of the population claims Christian belief or affiliation. Although formally ...

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

'' and retainers of the early

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 ...

in Japan. The conspiracy - motivated by the Christian daimyō

Arima Harunobu was a Japanese samurai lord who was the daimyō, daimyo of Shimabara Domain and the head of the Hizen-Arima clan''.'' In his early years, he was a retainer of Ryūzōji clan. Biography Harunobu was born in Hinoe Castle, the Hizen-Arima clan, Ar ...

's desire to retake

Arima Arima, officially The Royal Chartered Borough of Arima is the easternmost and second largest in area of the three boroughs of Trinidad and Tobago. It is geographically adjacent to Sangre Grande and Arouca at the south central foothills of th ...

lands in

Hizen was an old province of Japan in the area of the Saga and Nagasaki prefectures. It was sometimes called , with Higo Province. Hizen bordered on the provinces of Chikuzen and Chikugo. The province was included in Saikaidō. It did not incl ...

that were lost in the

Sengoku The was a period in Japanese history of near-constant civil war and social upheaval from 1467 to 1615. The Sengoku period was initiated by the Ōnin War in 1467 which collapsed the feudal system of Japan under the Ashikaga shogunate. Various ...

wars - did much to shake the confidence that the Tokugawa regime placed on its Christian subjects, and was attributed as one of the reasons the Tokugawa eventually took an anti-Christian stance, which culminated in the persecution of Christians throughout the country.

Background

In 1543, during the wars of the

Sengoku period The was a period in History of Japan, Japanese history of near-constant civil war and social upheaval from 1467 to 1615. The Sengoku period was initiated by the Ōnin War in 1467 which collapsed the Feudalism, feudal system of Japan under the ...

, the Portuguese landed in Japan for the first time, and soon spread Christianity throughout Japan from Kyushu. Regional ''

'', or feudal lords, were eager to trade with the Portuguese for their European

arquebus An arquebus ( ) is a form of long gun that appeared in Europe and the Ottoman Empire during the 15th century. An infantryman armed with an arquebus is called an arquebusier. Although the term ''arquebus'', derived from the Dutch word ''Haakbus ...

, while the Portuguese saw the Japanese as potential converts to the Christian religion, preferring to trade with those who converted. Trade and religion thus tied, many ''daimyo'' became Christian, such that at the eve of unification of Japan 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 fello ...

in 1600, as many as 14 ''daimyo'' at the time were baptised. Even when some of those Christian ''daimyo'' supported Ieyasu at the decisive Battle of Sekigahara, many other Christian ''daimyo'' rallied around the heir of

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 any case, the question remained for the unifier of Japan where the Christian lords' loyalties ultimately lay.

, the daimyo of Hinoe Domain, became one of the most important supporters of the Church in post-Sekigahara Japan as Tokugawa Ieyasu became ''

shōgun , officially , was the title of the military dictators of Japan during most of the period spanning from 1185 to 1868. Nominally appointed by the Emperor, shoguns were usually the de facto rulers of the country, though during part of the Kamak ...

'' and purged his enemies, like the influential Christian lord Konishi Yukinaga. In the first decade of the

, Arima Harunobu was able to keep his fief and was given the right to send

red seal ships were Japanese armed merchant sailing ships bound for Southeast Asian ports with red-sealed letters patent issued by the early Tokugawa shogunate in the first half of the 17th century. Between 1600 and 1635, more than 350 Japanese ships went ...

to trade overseas. In one of these voyages in 1608, the crew of a red seal ship belonging to Harunobu became involved in a deadly quarrel in

Portuguese Macau Portuguese Macau (officially the Province of Macau until 1976, and then the Autonomous Region of Macau from 1976 to 1999) was a Portuguese colony that existed from the first official Portuguese settlement in 1557 to the end of colonial ru ...

after coming back from Cambodia to fetch a cargo of

agarwood Agarwood, aloeswood, eaglewood or gharuwood is a fragrant dark resinous wood used in incense, perfume, and small carvings. This resinous wood is most commonly referred to as "Oud" or "Oudh". It is formed in the heartwood of aquilaria trees wh ...

for Ieyasu, resulting in 50 Arima samurai being killed under the orders of the

Captain-major A donatary captain was a Portuguese colonial official to whom the Crown granted jurisdiction, rights, and revenues over some colonial territory. The recipients of these grants were called (donataries), because they had been given the grant as a ( ...

André Pessoa André — sometimes transliterated as Andre — is the French and Portuguese form of the name Andrew, and is now also used in the English-speaking world. It used in France, Quebec, Canada and other French-speaking countries. It is a variation o ...

. The same captain-major came to Nagasaki on the '' Nossa Senhora da Graça'' to trade in 1609, and Arima Harunobu took this opportunity to seek permission from Tokugawa Ieyasu to avenge his dead men. Ieyasu acceded - although the Portuguese controlled much of the

Nanban trade or the , was a period in the history of Japan from the arrival of Europeans in 1543 to the first '' Sakoku'' Seclusion Edicts of isolationism in 1614. Nanban (南蛮 Lit. "Southern barbarian") is a Japanese word which had been used to desig ...

, Ieyasu sought to decouple the close relationship between that trade and Christianity. Arima Harunobu thereupon took a flotilla of 1,200 men to attack Pessoa in Nagasaki, and after a three-day engagement, the ''Nossa Senhora da Graça'' sank in an explosion bringing Pessoa down with it on January 6, 1610. However, this victory for Harunobu soon led to his downfall.

Intrigues

For Arima's part in sinking the ''Nossa Senhora da Graça'', Ieyasu not only rewarded Arima Harunobu with a prized sword, but also presented his granddaughter Kunihime (国姫) as wife for Harunobu's son Naozumi. This proved to be problematic for the Arima, as Naozumi had followed Christianity like his father and had married a Christian girl. Naozumi eventually repudiated his legitimate wife in favour of Kunihime, showing that, rather than standing by his faith and family, Naozumi opted to not risk offending Ieyasu. Harunobu apparently felt that his efforts during the ''Nossa Senhora da Graça'' incident warranted further rewards — namely the return of the territories Isahaya and Kōjiro (神代) in

Hizen Province was an old province of Japan in the area of the Saga and Nagasaki prefectures. It was sometimes called , with Higo Province. Hizen bordered on the provinces of Chikuzen and Chikugo. The province was included in Saikaidō. It did not incl ...

that the Arima lost during the

. To this end, Harunobu bribed Okamoto Daihachi (岡本大八,

baptismal name A Christian name, sometimes referred to as a baptismal name, is a religious personal name given on the occasion of a Christian baptism, though now most often assigned by parents at birth. In English-speaking cultures, a person's Christian name ...

Paulo), a Christian aide to the ''

rōjū The , usually translated as ''Elder'', was one of the highest-ranking government posts under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan. The term refers either to individual Elders, or to the Council of Elders as a whole; under the first two ''shō ...

Honda Masazumi (1566 – April 5, 1637) was a Japanese samurai of the Azuchi–Momoyama period through early Edo period, who served the Tokugawa clan. He later became a ''daimyō'', and one of the first rōjū of the Tokugawa shogunate. Masazumi was born in 156 ...

, who advised Ieyasu on affairs concerning the redistribution of fiefs. However, Okamoto took the money and did not follow through; instead, he strung Harunobu on by forging documents promising to reward Arima with the territories, then claiming that the reward had been revoked due to the interference of the Governor of Nagasaki Hasegawa Fujihiro. Harunobu, after seeking further assistance from a Jesuit priest on this matter to no avail, brought the issue directly to Ieyasu in 1612, bringing Okamoto's scam to light. At this juncture, Naozumi turned against his father and told Ieyasu of Harunobu's underhanded dealings with Okamoto. That the investiture of fiefs, a matter that defines the feudal relations of the Tokugawa shogunate, could be bought and sold was deeply troubling to Tokugawa Ieyasu. He sentenced Okamoto Daihachi to

death by burning Death by burning (also known as immolation) is an execution and murder method involving combustion or exposure to extreme heat. It has a long history as a form of public capital punishment, and many societies have employed it as a punishment f ...

for forging shōgunal documents, but not before Daihachi had a chance to reveal that Arima Harunobu had conspired to kill Hasegawa Fujihiro. As the important port city of Nagasaki was governed directly by a shogunate-appointed official (rather than through a daimyō), this conspiracy was seen as an affront to Tokugawa rule. For this and his bribery, Harunobu was exiled to Kai Province in late 1612, and was ordered to commit suicide by '' seppuku'' the next year. However, Harunobu refused to kill himself on grounds of his faith, and instead had his head cut off. Naozumi was allowed to inherit his father's fief for his part in denouncing Harunobu.

Aftermath

The fact that the perpetrators of this episode of bribery, conspiracy, forgery, and attempted murder were both Christians was not lost on Ieyasu. The retired shōgun was further incensed to hear that Christian followers had gathered at Okamoto's execution to offer prayers and sing hymns, cementing in his mind that the creed encouraged insubordination against the shogunate. Ieyasu later referenced this incident along with other executions of Christian criminals in 1614: In the same year as the Daihachi incident was uncovered, Ieyasu evicted the Christian servants of his household and forbade his vassals from following Christianity or risk having their revenues withheld. On January 27, 1614, the prohibition was extended to everyone regardless of class or origin, including all missionaries without exception. This order was unevenly followed by Ieyasu's vassals, as domains that were predominantly Christian or sufficiently far from the central did not interfere with their Christian subjects up to 1623. However, in

Shimabara Domain The was a Japanese domain of the Edo period. It is associated with Hizen Province in modern-day Saga Prefecture.DF__...,_who_were_''Kirishitan">DF_6-7_of_80/nowiki>">DF__...,_who_were_''Kirishitan_daimyō.html" ;"title="Kirishitan.html" ;"title ...

(formerly the Hinoe Domain), Arima Naozumi apostatized and pursued a campaign of persecution of Christians, killing even his two half-brothers, aged 8 and 6. He was transferred to

Nobeoka is a Cities of Japan, city located in the north of Miyazaki Prefecture, Japan. As of June 1, 2019, the city has an estimated population of 119,521 and a population density of 138 persons per km². The total area is . History The city was offici ...

Hyūga Province was an old province of Japan on the east coast of Kyūshū, corresponding to the modern Miyazaki Prefecture. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''Hyūga''" in . It was sometimes called or . Hyūga bordered on Bungo, Higo, Ōsumi, and Sats ...

in mid-1614, leaving behind a restive Christian population that would instigate the Shimabara Rebellion in 1637.

References

Citations

Bibliography

* * * * * * *{{cite journal, last1=Ribeiro, first1=Madalena, title=The Christian Nobility of Kyushu. A Perusal of Jesuit Sources, journal=Bulletin of Portuguese - Japanese Studies, date=2006, volume=13, pages=45-64, url=http://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=36101302 1612 in Japan History of Christianity in Japan Corruption in Japan Document forgery Arima clan