was the 11th King of the Second Shō Dynasty of the

Ryukyu Kingdom The Ryukyu Kingdom, Middle Chinese: , , Classical Chinese: (), Historical English names: ''Lew Chew'', ''Lewchew'', ''Luchu'', and ''Loochoo'', Historical French name: ''Liou-tchou'', Historical Dutch name: ''Lioe-kioe'' was a kingdom in the ...

, who held the throne from 1669 until his death in 1709."Shō Tei." ''Okinawa konpakuto jiten'' (沖縄コンパクト事典, "Okinawa Compact Encyclopedia")
Ryukyu Shimpo
(琉球新報). 1 March 2003. Accessed 29 January 2010. He was the ruler of Ryukyu at the time of the compiling of the ''

Chūzan Seifu was an official history of the Ryūkyū Kingdom compiled between 1697 and 1701 by a group of scholar-officials led by Sai Taku. It was a Kanbun translated version of ''Chūzan Seikan''. Later, it was rewritten into Classical Chinese by Sai Tak ...

'' (a document documenting Ryukyuan history). Shō Tei received a

Confucian Confucianism, also known as Ruism or Ru classicism, is a system of thought and behavior originating in ancient China. Variously described as tradition, a philosophy, a Religious Confucianism, religion, a humanistic or rationalistic religion, ...

education, and was the first Ryukyuan monarch to do so. Shō Tei was the monarch at the time when the Japanese ''

bakufu , 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 Kamakur ...

'' began taking notice of trade of

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of va ...

goods passing through the islands, during the period of ''

sakoku was the Isolationism, isolationist Foreign policy of Japan, foreign policy of the Japanese Tokugawa shogunate under which, for a period of 265 years during the Edo period (from 1603 to 1868), relations and trade between Japan and other countri ...

'' (when no contact between Japan and the outside world was foreign policy). The ''bakufu'', instead of punishing the Ryukyuan government, ordered detailed reports on the trade in 1685. The following year, trade was restricted to 2,000

ryō The was a gold currency unit in the shakkanhō system in pre- Meiji Japan. It was eventually replaced with a system based on the ''yen''. Origins The ''ryō'' was originally a unit of weight from China, the ''tael.'' It came into use in Japan ...

worth per term, and was only able to be sold in markets that did not compete with the

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

enclave in

Nagasaki is the capital and the largest city of Nagasaki Prefecture on the island of Kyushu in Japan. It became the sole port used for trade with the Portuguese and Dutch during the 16th through 19th centuries. The Hidden Christian Sites in the ...

. The result of such trade made the Ryukyuan economy boom. Shō Tei is the final Ryukyuan monarch to be given a god's name in official histories, due to the changing image of the position (less a deity, more a Confucian sage). He was buried at the royal mausoleum

Tamaudun is one of the three royal mausoleums of the Ryukyu Kingdom, along with Urasoe yōdore at Urasoe Castle and Izena Tamaudun near Izena Castle in Izena, Okinawa. The mausoleum is located in Shuri, Okinawa, and was built for Ryūkyūan royalty in ...

in Shuri.

References

Second Shō dynasty Kings of Ryūkyū 1645 births 1709 deaths {{RyukyuKingdom-stub