refers to a school of

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

historical and

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 ''Shintois ...

studies that arose in the

Mito Domain was a Japanese domain of the Edo period. It was associated with Hitachi Province in modern-day Ibaraki Prefecture.Ibaraki Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Ibaraki Prefecture has a population of 2,871,199 (1 June 2019) and has a geographic area of . Ibaraki Prefecture borders Fukushima Prefecture to the north, ...

Early

The school had its genesis in 1657 when

Tokugawa Mitsukuni , also known as , was a Japanese daimyo who was known for his influence in the politics of the early Edo period. He was the third son of Tokugawa Yorifusa (who in turn was the eleventh son of Tokugawa Ieyasu) and succeeded him, becoming the seco ...

(1628–1700), second head of the Mito Domain, commissioned the compilation of the ''

Dai Nihonshi The ''Dai Nihonshi'' (大日本史), literally ''History of Great Japan'', is a book on the history of Japan. It was begun in the 17th century, during the Edo period, by Tokugawa Mitsukuni, the head of the Mito branch of the Tokugawa family. Af ...

''. Among scholars gathered for the project were

Asaka Tanpaku Asaka may refer to: Cities * Asaka, Saitama, Japan * Asaka, Uzbekistan People * Asaka-no-miya (朝香) ''ōke'' (princely house), a branch of the Japanese Imperial Family * Asaka (musician) (born 1999), Japanese singer * Asaka Kubo (born 1979), J ...

(1656–1737),

Sassa Munekiyo Sassa is a frazione in the Province of L'Aquila in the Abruzzo region of Italy. After the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake, it has a population of about 2500 inhabitants considering small villages around this frazione. The frazione of Sassa is compos ...

(1640–1698), Kuriyama Senpō (1671–1706), and

Miyake Kanran Miyake may refer to: Places * Miyake, Nara, a town located in Kansai * Miyake, Tokyo, a village located in Tokyo * Miyakejima, an island in the Izu Islands, often shortened to Miyake * Miyakezaka, a neighborhood in Chiyoda, Tokyo, often shortened t ...

(1673–1718). The fundamental approach of the project was

Neo-Confucianist Neo-Confucianism (, often shortened to ''lǐxué'' 理學, literally "School of Principle") is a moral, ethical, and metaphysical Chinese philosophy influenced by Confucianism, and originated with Han Yu (768–824) and Li Ao (772–841) in th ...

, based on the view that historical development followed moral laws. Tokugawa Mitsukuni believed that Japan, as a nation that had long been under the unified rule of the

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

, was a perfect exemplar of a "nation" as understood in Sinocentric thought. The ''Dai Nihon-shi'' thus became a history of Japan as ruled by the emperors and emphasised respect for the imperial court and

deities. In order to record historical facts, the school's historians gathered local historical sources, often compiling their own historical works in the process. Early Mitogaku scholarship was focused on historiography and scholarly work.

Late

Around the end of the eighteenth century, Mitogaku came to address contemporary social and political issues, beginning the era of Later Mitogaku. The ninth Mito clan leader,

Tokugawa Nariaki Tokugawa Nariaki (徳川斉昭, April 4, 1800 – September 29, 1860) was a prominent Japanese ''daimyō'' who ruled the Mito Domain (now Ibaraki Prefecture) and contributed to the rise of nationalism and the Meiji Restoration. Biography C ...

(1800–1860), greatly expanded Mitogaku by establishing the

Kōdōkan The , or ''Kōdōkan'' (講道館), is the headquarters of the worldwide judo community. The ''kōdōkan'' was founded in 1882 by Kanō Jigorō, the founder of judo, and is now an eight-story building in Tokyo. Etymology Literally, ''kō'' ( ...

as the clan school. In addition to

Confucianist 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 religion, a humanistic or rationalistic religion, a way of governing, or a ...

and

kokugaku ''Kokugaku'' ( ja, 國學, label=Kyūjitai, ja, 国学, label=Shinjitai; literally "national study") was an academic movement, a school of Japanese philology and philosophy originating during the Tokugawa period. Kokugaku scholars worked to refo ...

thought, the school also absorbed knowledge from medicine, astronomy and other natural sciences. The Later Mitogaku era lasted until the

Bakumatsu 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 government ...

period. The school exerted a major influence on the

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 ...

movement and became one of the driving forces behind the

Meiji Restoration The , referred to at the time as the , and also known as the Meiji Renovation, Revolution, Regeneration, Reform, or Renewal, was a political event that restored practical imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Although there were ...

. However, it failed to gain the protection of the new government. The ''Kōdōkan'' was disbanded and its library largely taken over by the state.

Present

The ''Mito-shi Gakkai'' of

Mito city is the capital city of Ibaraki Prefecture, in the northern Kantō region of Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 269,330 in 123,282 households and a population density of 1239 persons per km2. The percentage of the population aged ...

, Ibaraki prefecture, is undertaking research into the historical and ideological aspects of Mitogaku. Major works of the school include ''

Shintō shūsei 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 ''Shintois ...

'', ''

Dai Nihon Jingi Shi Dai may refer to: Names * Dai (given name), a Welsh or Japanese masculine given name * Dai (surname) (戴), a Chinese surname Places and regimes * Dai Commandery, a commandery of the state of Zhao and in early imperial China * Dai County, in Xinz ...

'', and ''

Jingi Shiryō are the deities, divinities, spirits, phenomena or "holy powers", that are venerated in the Shinto religion. They can be elements of the landscape, forces of nature, or beings and the qualities that these beings express; they can also be the s ...

'', and collections and studies of

fudoki are ancient reports on provincial culture, geography, and oral tradition presented to the reigning monarchs of Japan, also known as local gazetteers. They contain agricultural, geographical, and historical records as well as mythology and ...

and studies of the ''

Kogo Shūi is a historical record of the Inbe clan of Japan written in the early Heian period (794–1185). It was composed by Inbe no Hironari (斎部広成) in 807 using material transmitted orally over several generations of the Inbe clan. Background H ...

''.

Notes

References

Koschmann, J. Victor. ''The Mito Ideology: Discourse, Reform, and Insurrection in Late Tokugawa Japan, 1790-1864''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987. {{Authority control Japanese philosophy Mito Domain Confucianism in Japan

Early

Late

Present

See also

Notes

References