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 ...

under the

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 ...

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 ...

. It was located in southern

Ōmi Province was a province of Japan, which today comprises Shiga Prefecture. It was one of the provinces that made up the Tōsandō circuit. Its nickname is . Under the ''Engishiki'' classification system, Ōmi was ranked as one of the 13 "great countrie ...

, in the

Kansai region The or the , lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshū. The region includes the prefectures of Nara, Wakayama, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo and Shiga, often also Mie, sometimes Fukui, Tokushima and Tottori. The metropolita ...

of central

Honshu , historically called , is the largest and most populous island of Japan. It is located south of Hokkaidō across the Tsugaru Strait, north of Shikoku across the Inland Sea, and northeast of Kyūshū across the Kanmon Straits. The island separ ...

. The domain was centered at

Zeze Castle thumbnail, 260px, aerial photograph of site of Zeze Castle thumbnail, 260px, Edo period layout of Zeze Castle , is a ''hirashiro''-style Japanese castle located in eastern part of the city of Ōtsu, Shiga Prefecture, Japan. Overview Zeze Cast ...

, located on the shore of

Lake Biwa is the largest freshwater lake in Japan, located entirely within Shiga Prefecture (west-central Honshu), northeast of the former capital city of Kyoto. Lake Biwa is an ancient lake, over 4 million years old. It is estimated to be the 13th ol ...

in what is now the city of

Ōtsu 270px, Ōtsu City Hall is the capital city of Shiga Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 343,991 in 153458 households and a population density of 740 persons per km². The total area of the city is . Geography Ōtsu is ...

Shiga Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Shiga Prefecture has a population of 1,412,916 (1 October 2015) and has a geographic area of . Shiga Prefecture borders Fukui Prefecture to the north, Gifu Prefecture to the nort ...

History

Zeze controlled entry into

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

from the east, and was thus of great strategic importance to the

. As with many of the ''fudai'' domains of the early Edo period, the control of Zeze Domain changed frequently between various clans; however, after the appointment of a cadet branch of the

Honda clan The is a Japanese family that claims descent from the medieval court noble Fujiwara no Kanemichi. The family settled in Mikawa and served the Matsudaira clan as retainers. Later, when the main Matsudaira family became the Tokugawa clan, the Hon ...

in 1651, the domain remained under Honda control until the end of the shogunate. With a ''

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 70,00 ''

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 ...

'' at its height, it was the second largest domain in Ōmi Province after

Hikone Domain was a '' fudai'' feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan. It was located in eastern Ōmi Province, in the Kansai region of central Honshu. The domain was centered at Hikone Castle, located in what is now the city of ...

. In 1601, shortly after 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 ...

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 ...

ordered then construction of Zeze Castle, and assigned

Toda Kazuaki was a samurai in the service of Tokugawa Ieyasu. In 1601, Ieyasu gave Kazuaki the fiefdom of Zeze (30,000 koku) in Omi is a hereditary noble title ('' kabane'') of ancient Japan. It was given to the descendants of the Imperial Family before Em ...

, formerly 5000 ''koku'' ''

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.'' However ...

'' with holdings 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 ...

to be ''

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 ...

'' of the new 30,000 ''koku'' domain. He built the ''

jōkamachi The term refers to a type of urban structures in Japan in which the city surrounds a feudal lord's castle. These cities did not necessarily form around castles after the Edo period; some are known as Jin'yamachi, cities that have evolved around J ...

'' and developed ''shijimi'' clans as a local industry. His son,

Toda Ujikane was a Japanese ''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 ...

distinguished himself at the

Siege of Osaka The was a series of battles undertaken by the Japanese Tokugawa shogunate against the Toyotomi clan, and ending in that clan's destruction. Divided into two stages (winter campaign and summer campaign), and lasting from 1614 to 1615, the siege ...

and was awarded with the larger

Amagasaki Domain 250px, Reconstructed Amagasaki Castle tenshu was a feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in Settsu Province in what is now the southeastern portion of modern-day Hyōgo Prefecture. It had its administrative h ...

. Zeze was awarded to

Honda Yasutoshi Honda Yasutoshi may refer to: *Honda Yasutoshi (1569–1621), daimyō of Zeze Domain 1617 - 1621 *Honda Yasutoshi (1693–1747), daimyō of Zeze Domain 1719 - 1747 See also

*Honda clan {{Human name disambiguation, name=Honda Yasutoshi ...

, who had also distinguished himself at the Siege of Osaka. His son, Honda Toshitsugu, was relocated to

Nishio Domain was a feudal domain of the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in former Mikawa Province, in what is now the modern-day city of Nishio in Aichi Prefecture, Japan. It was centered on Nishio Castle. History When Tokugawa Ieyasu be ...

in 1621. Zeze then passed briefly to the Suganuma and the Ishikawa clans, before being returned to Honda Yoshitsugu in 1651, but with an increase in ''kokudaka'' to 70,000 ''koku''. Under the early days of Hondo rule, the domain prospered greatly with

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 ...

works and the opening of new rice lands continuing to revenues ad with welfare measures for the poor. However, by the middle of the Edo period, the domain's finances began to falter, and under the 6th ''daimyō'' Honda Yasutada, failed attempts at fiscal reform only made matters worse. There were widespread peasant's uprisings around 1781. Conditions continued to deteriorate until the time of the 10th ''daimyō'' Honda Yasusada, with conflict erupting between various factions of the domain's retainers over reform measures. The situation resulted in intervention by the shogunate and the purge of a number of senior retainers. The situation stabilized by 1808, when a

han school The was an educational institution in the Edo period of Japan, originally established to educate children of ''daimyō'' (feudal lords) and their retainers in the domains outside of the capital. These institutions were also known as ''hangaku' ...

was opened. During the

Bakumatsu period was the final years of the Edo period when the Tokugawa shogunate ended. Between 1853 and 1867, Japan ended its isolationist foreign policy known as and changed from a feudal Tokugawa shogunate to the modern empire of the Meiji govern ...

, Zeze was violently divided between the pro-''

Sonnō Jōi was a ''yojijukugo'' (four-character compound) phrase used as the rallying cry and slogan of a political movement in Japan in the 1850s and 1860s during the Bakumatsu period. Based on Neo-Confucianism and Japanese nativism, the movement sought ...

'' faction and the pro-shogunate faction. The pro-shogunate faction, at times assisted by the ''

Shinsengumi The was a special police force organized by the (military government) during Japan's Bakumatsu period (late Tokugawa shogunate) in 1863. It was active until 1869. It was founded to protect the shogunate representatives in Kyoto at a time when ...

'' killed a number of the pro-''

'' faction, including some prominent officials. This created a backlash in popular opinion, and with the start of the

Boshin War The , sometimes known as the Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War, was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a clique seeking to seize political power in the name of the Imperi ...

, the domain quickly sided with the imperial cause and sent troops to attack

Kuwana Domain 250px, Reconstructed portion of Kuwana Castle was a Japanese feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in Ise Province. It was centered on Kuwana Castle in what is now the city of Kuwana, Mie Prefecture. It was con ...

. As with other domains, Zeze was abolished in 1871 with the

abolition of the han system The in the Empire of Japan and its replacement by a system of prefectures in 1871 was the culmination of the Meiji Restoration begun in 1868, the starting year of the Meiji period. Under the reform, all daimyos (, ''daimyō'', feudal lords) ...

, becoming Zeze Prefecture, which was merged with Ōtsu prefecture, and subsequently Shiga Prefecture.

Bakumatsu period holdings

As with most domains in the

han system ( ja, 藩, "domain") is a Japanese historical term for the estate of a daimyo in the Edo period (1603–1868) and early Meiji period (1868–1912). Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"Han"in ''Japan Encyclopedia'', p. 283. or (daimyo domain) s ...

, Ōmizo Domain consisted of a discontinuous territories calculated to provide the assigned ''

'', based on periodic

cadastral A cadastre or cadaster is a comprehensive recording of the real estate or real property's metes-and-bounds of a country.Jo Henssen, ''Basic Principles of the Main Cadastral Systems in the World,'/ref> Often it is represented graphically in a cad ...

surveys and projected agricultural yields.Elison, George and Bardwell L. Smith (1987)
''Warlords, Artists, & Commoners: Japan in the Sixteenth Century,'' p. 18
*

**21 villages in Shiga District **76 villages in Kurita District **1 village in Kōka District **7 villages in Azai District **5 villages in Ika District **18 villages in Takashima District *

Kawachi Province was a province of Japan in the eastern part of modern Osaka Prefecture. It originally held the southwestern area that was split off into Izumi Province. It was also known as . Geography The area was radically different in the past, with Kawachi ...

**15 villages in Nishgori District

List of daimyō

References

*''The content of this article was largely derived from that of the corresponding article on Japanese Wikipedia.'' * *

External links

Notes

{{Reflist Domains of Japan 1601 establishments in Japan History of Shiga Prefecture Ōmi Province