(September 11, 1719, in

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 ...

, Japan – August 25, 1788, in Edo) was a chamberlain (''sobashū'') and a senior counselor (''

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 '' sh� ...

'') to the ''

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 Kamakur ...

'' Tokugawa Ieharu of the

Tokugawa Shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in ...

, in 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 character ...

of Japan. Tanuma and his son exercised tremendous power, especially in the last 14 years of shogun Ieharu's reign.Hane, M. (2018). ''Premodern Japan: A historical survey''. Routledge. He is known for the economic reforms of the

Tenmei is a Japanese era name (年号, ''nengō'', literally "years name") for the years between the An'ei Era and before the Kansei Era, from April 1781 through January 1789. The reigning emperor was . Change of era * 1781 : The new era name of Tenm ...

era and rampant corruption. He was also a ''

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 nominall ...

'' of the Sagara Domain. Tanuma used the title Tonomo-no-kami. Tanuma's reforms aimed to rectify the systemic problems in Japan's economy, particularly the trade imbalance between the provinces (''han'') and the shogunal areas (''tenryō'') of Japan. The previous shogun,

Tokugawa Yoshimune was the eighth ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan, ruling from 1716 until his abdication in 1745. He was the son of Tokugawa Mitsusada, the grandson of Tokugawa Yorinobu, and the great-grandson of Tokugawa Ieyasu. Lineage Yoshimune ...

, sought to rectify the shogunate's economic problems by frugality and a focus on agriculture. Instead, Tanuma debased currency, sold monopoly rights to dealers, and taxed merchant guilds. To stem unfavorable balances of trade and bullion outflow, he took steps to increase foreign exports and set export quotas for Akita copper mines (copper being the primary

coin A coin is a small, flat (usually depending on the country or value), round piece of metal or plastic used primarily as a medium of exchange or legal tender. They are standardized in weight, and produced in large quantities at a mint in orde ...

age metal during that period), despite higher domestic prices. Tanuma's administration granted monopoly patents for numerous products, including iron, brass, sulfur, ginseng and lamp oil. Large investments were made into the massive

drainage Drainage is the natural or artificial removal of a surface's water and sub-surface water from an area with excess of water. The internal drainage of most agricultural soils is good enough to prevent severe waterlogging (anaerobic conditio ...

program to increase the agricultural land. Despite Tanuma's intentions to serve the public good, he was deeply corrupt and exacerbated corruption in government. Several years of crop failures from 1783 to 1787, resulting from drought followed by floods, led to famine and frequent riots. In

4 (1784), Okitsugu's son, the '' wakadoshiyori'' (junior counselor) , was assassinated inside Edo Castle. Okitomo was killed in front of his father as both were returning to their ''norimono'' after a meeting of the Counselors of State had broken up. Okitomo was killed by Sano Masakoto, a ''

hatamoto A was a high ranking samurai in the direct service of the Tokugawa shogunate of feudal Japan. While all three of the shogunates in Japanese history had official retainers, in the two preceding ones, they were referred to as ''gokenin.'' Howev ...

''. The involvement of senior figures in the ''

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 Kamakura ...

'' was suspected, but only the assassin himself was punished. The famine led to a spike in a number of protests and peasant rebellions, culminating in the

riots of 1787. Traditionalist opponents of the reform interpreted it as the "voice of Heaven" being followed by the "voice of the people". With the assassination of his son and the death of his patron Tokugawa Ieharu, Tanuma fell from power. The result was that the reforms and the relaxation of the strictures of ''

sakoku was the isolationist 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 countries were severely limited, and nearly ...

'' were blocked.Screech, pp. 148–151, 163–170, 248.

Notes

References

* Hall, John Whitney. (1955). ''Tanuma Okitsugu, 1719–1788: Forerunner of Modern Japan''. Cambridge:

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the reti ...

OCLC 445621
* Screech, Timon. (2006)
''Secret Memoirs of the Shoguns: Isaac Titsingh and Japan, 1779–1822''.
London: RoutledgeCurzon.
OCLC 65177072
* Titsingh, Isaac. (1820)
''Mémoires et anecdotes sur la dynastie régnante des djogouns, souverains du Japon''
Paris: Nepveu. .

Notes

References

See also