Post-towns

Express Post

In the 17th century, the Edo shogunate authorities placed strong emphasis on revitalizing the highway system to ensure that orders and messages could be relayed quickly, efficiently, and safely between Edo and the provinces. This was essential for effective government. Among the many different types of travelers regularly seen along the ‘Five Roads’ were runners,… [Read more]

The Early Road System

Most accounts date the origins of a national system of highways to 702AD: the year of the Taiho Code. Among other things, the Taiho reforms formalized a system of national administration (known as the “Ritsuryo system”), based on a division of the country into seven major regions, or ‘circuits’, and an additional one incorporating the… [Read more]

The Function of Post-towns

Post-towns were spaced out along the old highways of Japan for the convenience of travelers. In the eyes of the Tokugawa government, ‘travelers’ were officials, daimyo and samurai who were moving around on business connected either with their administrative responsibilities or with the system of alternate attendance (sankin kotai). The term did not include individuals… [Read more]

The Story of Hikone Castle Town

Hikone castle is one of only twelve in Japan with its original keep still intact. It is perhaps better known, however, as the home of the Ii – one of the most famous samurai families in Japan. Ii Naomasa, the founder of the line, was a native of present-day Shizuoka prefecture and a close ally… [Read more]

Main Castle Towns

At the time of the Meiji Restoration, in 1868, some 250 castle towns (jokamachi) formed the core of a well developed urban network in Japan. Although constructed primarily as defended residences for provincial lords (daimyo) and their retainers, castle towns necessarily became local administrative headquarters through which political authority was channeled from the shogun’s citadel… [Read more]

The Five Roads

There are five highways (“gokaido”) in Japan which were formally established during the Edo period as the official routes which the daimyo should follow on sankin kotai processions. All of them terminated at Nihonbashi in the center of Edo. They are the: * Tokaido, which runs from Kyoto to Edo following the Pacific coast and coastal… [Read more]

Old and New Highways

Tracing the path of a bygone highway across Japan, it seems easy to distinguish between the ‘old’ and the ‘modern’ routes. Along the Nakasendo, for example, there are many places where the old and new highways overlap for a while before the two routes diverge. Often this occurs on the approach to an Edo period… [Read more]