was a Japanese Zen Buddhist

monk A monk (; from , ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a man who is a member of a religious order and lives in a monastery. A monk usually lives his life in prayer and contemplation. The concept is ancient and can be seen in many reli ...

and

diplomat A diplomat (from ; romanization, romanized ''diploma'') is a person appointed by a state (polity), state, International organization, intergovernmental, or Non-governmental organization, nongovernmental institution to conduct diplomacy with one ...

in the

Muromachi period The , also known as the , is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate ( or ), which was officially established in 1338 by the first Muromachi ...

.Goodrich, L. Carrington ''et al.'' (1976)
''Dictionary of Ming biography, 1368-1644,'' Vol. II, pp. 1149-1150.
/ref> He was the chief envoy of a 1511–1513 mission sent by the Ashikaga shogunate to the court of the

Zhengde Emperor The Zhengde Emperor (26 October 149120 April 1521), also known by his temple name as the Emperor Wuzong of Ming, personal name Zhu Houzhao, was the 11th List of emperors of the Ming dynasty, emperor of the Ming dynasty, reigning from 1505 to 1 ...

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

Tofuku-ji abbot

In 1486, the

Rinzai The Rinzai school (, zh, t=臨濟宗, s=临济宗, p=Línjì zōng), named after Linji Yixuan (Romaji: Rinzai Gigen, died 866 CE) is one of three sects of Zen in Japanese Buddhism, along with Sōtō and Ōbaku. The Chinese Linji school of ...

monk Keigo was the 171st

abbot Abbot is an ecclesiastical title given to the head of an independent monastery for men in various Western Christian traditions. The name is derived from ''abba'', the Aramaic form of the Hebrew ''ab'', and means "father". The female equivale ...

of the Tofuku-ji monastery when the honorific title "Ryōan" was conferred by Emperor Go-Tsuchimikado. He was already considered famous when he was designated by

Ashikaga Yoshizumi was the 11th ''shōgun'' of the Ashikaga shogunate who reigned from 1494 to 1508 during the Muromachi period of Japan. He was the son of Ashikaga Masatomo and grandson of the sixth ''shōgun'' Ashikaga Yoshinori.Titsingh, Isaac. (1834). His ...

to lead the 1511 mission to China;Goodrich
pp. 1231-1232.
/ref> and Yoshizumi conferred the further honorific title "Butsunichi Zenji," perhaps with the intention of impressing the Chinese.

Mission to China

The economic benefit of the Sinocentric tribute system was profitable trade. The tally trade (''kangō bōeki'' or ''kanhe maoyi'' in Chinese) involved exchanges of Japanese products for Chinese goods. The Chinese "tally" was a certificate issued by the Ming. The first 100 such tallies were conveyed to Japan in 1404. Only those with this formal proof of Imperial permission represented by the document were officially allowed to travel and trade within the boundaries of China; and only those diplomatic missions presenting authentic tallies were received as legitimate ambassadors.Fogel, Joshua A. (2009)
''Articulating the Sinosphere: Sino-Japanese Relations in Space and Time,'' p. 27

Selected works

* ''Goroku'' * ''Jinshin nyūmin ki''

Notes

References

* Fogel, Joshua A. (2009). ''Articulating the Sinosphere: Sino-Japanese Relations in Space and Time.'' Cambridge:

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is an academic publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University. It is a member of the Association of University Presses. Its director since 2017 is George Andreou. The pres ...

. ; * Goodrich, Luther Carrington and Zhaoying Fang. (1976)
''Dictionary of Ming biography, 1368-1644'' (明代名人傳), Vol. I ''Dictionary of Ming biography, 1368-1644'' (明代名人傳), Vol. II.
New York:

Columbia University Press Columbia University Press is a university press based in New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's la ...

. ; * Titsingh, Isaac, ed. (1834). iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652">Hayashi_Gahō.html" ;"title="iyun-sai Rin-siyo/ iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652 ''Nipon o daï itsi ran">Hayashi Gahō">iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652">Hayashi_Gahō.html" ;"title="iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō">iyun-sai Rin-siyo/Hayashi Gahō, 1652 ''Nipon o daï itsi ran; ou
Annales des empereurs du Japon.
' Paris: Royal Asiatic Society">Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland. * Yoda, Yoshiie. (1996). ''The Foundations of Japan's Modernization: a comparison with China's Path towards Modernization.'' Leiden: Brill. ;

External links