, born , was the wife of

Emperor Taishō was the 123rd Emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession, and the second ruler of the Empire of Japan from 30 July 1912 until his death in 1926. The Emperor's personal name was . According to Japanese custom, while reigni ...

and the mother of Emperor Shōwa of Japan. Her posthumous name, ''Teimei'', means "enlightened constancy".

Biography

Sadako Kujō was born on 25 June 1884 in

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.46 ...

, as the fourth daughter of Duke Michitaka Kujō, head of Kujō branch of the

Fujiwara clan was a powerful family of imperial regents in Japan, descending from the Nakatomi clan and, as legend held, through them their ancestral god Ame-no-Koyane. The Fujiwara prospered since the ancient times and dominated the imperial court until th ...

. Her mother was Ikuko Noma. She married then-Crown Prince Yoshihito (the future

) on 10 May 1900, at the age of 15. The couple lived in the newly constructed

Akasaka Palace , or the , is one of the two state guest houses of the Government of Japan. The other state guesthouse is the Kyoto State Guest House. The palace was originally built as the in 1909. Today the palace is designated by the Government of Japan a ...

in Tokyo, outside of the main

Tokyo Imperial Palace The is the main residence of the Emperor of Japan. It is a large park-like area located in the Chiyoda district of the Chiyoda ward of Tokyo and contains several buildings including the where the Emperor has his living quarters, the where va ...

complex. When she gave birth to a son, Prince

Hirohito Emperor , commonly known in English-speaking countries by his personal name , was the 124th emperor of Japan, ruling from 25 December 1926 until his death in 1989. Hirohito and his wife, Empress Kōjun, had two sons and five daughters; he was ...

(the future Emperor Shōwa) in 1901, she was the first official wife of a Crown Prince or Emperor to have given birth to the official heir to the throne since 1750. She became Empress (Kōgō) when her husband ascended to the throne on 30 July 1912. Given her husband's weak physical and mental condition, she exerted a strong influence on imperial life, and was an active patron of Japanese Red Cross Society. The relations between the Emperor and Empress were very good, as evidenced by Emperor Taishō's lack of interest in taking

concubine Concubinage is an interpersonal and sexual relationship between a man and a woman in which the couple does not want, or cannot enter into a full marriage. Concubinage and marriage are often regarded as similar but mutually exclusive. Concubi ...

s, thus breaking with hundreds of years of imperial tradition, and by her giving birth to four sons. After the death of Emperor Taishō on 25 December 1926, her title became that of (which means "widow of the former emperor"). She openly objected to Japan's involvement in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, which might have caused conflict with her son, Hirohito. From 1943, she also worked behind the scenes with her third son Prince Takamatsu to bring about the downfall of

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is ...

Hideki Tōjō Hideki Tojo (, ', December 30, 1884 – December 23, 1948) was a Japanese politician, general of the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA), and convicted war criminal who served as prime minister of Japan and president of the Imperial Rule Assista ...

. She was a

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

adherent who had the faith of the

Lotus Sutra The ''Lotus Sūtra'' ( zh, 妙法蓮華經; sa, सद्धर्मपुण्डरीकसूत्रम्, translit=Saddharma Puṇḍarīka Sūtram, lit=Sūtra on the White Lotus of the True Dharma, italic=) is one of the most influ ...

and prayed with the

Shinto Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shint ...

ritual ceremonies of the Tokyo Imperial Palace. She died on 17 May 1951 at Omiya Palace in Tokyo, aged 66, and was buried near her husband, Emperor Taishō, in the ''Tama no higashi no misasagi'' (多摩東陵) at the

Musashi Imperial Graveyard is a mausoleum complex of the Japanese Emperors in Nagabusa-machi, Hachiōji, Tokyo, Japan. Located within a forest in the western suburbs of Tokyo and named for the ancient Musashi Province, the site contains the mausolea of Emperor Tais ...

in Tokyo.

Honours

National

* Grand Cordon of the Order of Meiji * Grand Cordon of the Order of the Precious Crown

Foreign

* : The 1,060th

Dame ''Dame'' is an honorific title and the feminine form of address for the honour of damehood in many Christian chivalric orders, as well as the Orders, decorations, and medals of the United Kingdom, British honours system and those of several oth ...

of the Royal Order of Queen Maria Luisa

Issue

Ancestry

Gallery

Image:Sadako Kujo wedding.jpg, Crown Princess Sadako on her wedding day in 1900 Image:Empress Teimei at enthronement in 1912.jpg, The newly crowned Empress Sadako in ''

jūnihitoe The , more formally known as the , is a style of formal court dress first worn in the Heian period by noble women and ladies-in-waiting at the Japanese Imperial Court. The was composed of a number of kimono-like robes, layered on top of each ot ...

'', 1912 Image:Empress Sadako with Prince of Wales in 1922.jpg, Empress Sadako with Prince Hirohito and the

Prince of Wales Prince of Wales ( cy, Tywysog Cymru, ; la, Princeps Cambriae/Walliae) is a title traditionally given to the heir apparent to the English and later British throne. Prior to the conquest by Edward I in the 13th century, it was used by the rule ...

(later

Edward VIII Edward VIII (Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David; 23 June 1894 – 28 May 1972), later known as the Duke of Windsor, was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire and Emperor of India from 20 January 1 ...

) in 1922 File:HIM Empress Tenmei's personal visit.jpg, Empress Sadako visiting survivors after the

Great Kanto earthquake Great may refer to: Descriptions or measurements * Great, a relative measurement in physical space, see Size * Greatness, being divine, majestic, superior, majestic, or transcendent People * List of people known as "the Great" *Artel Great ...

in 1923 File:Empress Teimei and Crown Prince Akihito.JPG, Empress Dowager Sadako with her grandson, Prince

Akihito is a member of the Imperial House of Japan who reigned as the 125th emperor of Japan from 7 January 1989 until his abdication on 30 April 2019. He presided over the Heisei era, ''Heisei'' being an expression of achieving peace worldwide. B ...

in 1949 File:Takatsukasa Wedding 1950 5 20.jpg, From left to right: Princess Kazuko,

Toshimichi Takatsukasa , son of Duke Nobusuke, was a Japanese researcher of trains. He was a descendant of Tokugawa Yoshinao and consequently was born into an aristocratic family, but, like all Japanese aristocrats, lost his title with the post-war legal reforms of 1 ...

, Emperor Hirohito,

Empress Nagako An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife ( empress consort), mother ( ...

, Empress Dowager Sadako in May 1950 File:Funeral_of_Empress_Teimei.JPG, Funeral of Empress Teimei, 22 June 1951 File:Tama-higashi-no-misasagi.jpg, Empress Teimei's mausoleum in the

Notes

References

* Bix, Herbert P. (2000). '' Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan.'' New York:

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News C ...

. ; * Fujitani, Takashi. (1998). ''Splendid Monarchy: Power and Pageantry in Modern Japan.''. Berkeley:

University of California Press The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by facul ...

. ; —Reprint edition, 1998. *

Hoyt Hoyt may refer to: Places Canada *Hoyt, New Brunswick United States *Hoyt, Colorado *Hoyt, Kansas *Hoyt, West Virginia *Hoyt, Wisconsin *Hoyt Peak, a mountain in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming Other uses *Hoyt (name) *Hoyt Archery, a bow manu ...

, Edwin P. (1992). ''Hirohito: The Emperor and the Man''. New York:

Praeger Publishers Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. (GPG), also known as ABC-Clio/Greenwood (stylized ABC-CLIO/Greenwood), is an educational and academic publisher (middle school through university level) which is today part of ABC-Clio. Established in 1967 as Gr ...

. ; {{DEFAULTSORT:Teimei, Empress 1884 births 1951 deaths People from Tokyo Japanese empresses Kujō family Fujiwara clan Emperor Taishō Grand Cordons (Imperial Family) of the Order of the Precious Crown Recipients of the Order of the Sacred Treasure, 1st class