Question

1. Describe the establishment of the Tokugawa Shougunate.

Answer 1

1. Tokugawa Shogunate was established due to the end of the warring states period. Japan was split between warring factions and internal strife and war was a constant thing. When Oda Nobunaga managed to unite them, Tokugawa shogunate began under a new Shogun.
2. The first Shogun was Tokugawa Ieyasu. He became the first Shogun and founder of the Tokugawa Shogunate following the Battle of Segihara and he stayed in power, officially and unofficially, until his death in 1616. He was one of the 3 unifiers of Japan alongside his former lord Oda Nobunaga
3. The city is Tokyo. The Tokugawa Shogun and his government lived and ruled from  the Edo Castle which is nowadays found in Tokyo and is a popular tourist destination. That is this period is also called the Edo period, because Tokyo used to be called edo before changing its name.
4. No he didn't. He tried to move Japan as far away from European relations as possible, severing many of the previous political ties. He did however keep trading with the Dutch company which had trading rights but it was heavily supervised and reduced compared to how it was before.
5. The effect was that they stopped being Samurai. Since they were warriors and mercenaries their job was to fight and that's what they knew. Since there was no warfare, they had to live off of something so many became merchants or diplomats and similar things, but many also failed to do anything and became rebellious or became hobos or similar things.
6. Iemitsu was famous for closing Japanese borders and kicking all Europeans out. He made them isolated and this isolation lasted for more than 200 years. All foreigners were forbidden from entering and Christians who were Japanese were hunted and crucified.
7. It is debatable whether there's 5 and how the 5 are split since various historians present their own theories. If we choose 5 classes, they can be 1. Samurai and Shogun - who were the military rulers; 2. Farmers - who produced all food and paid most of the taxes and comprised 80% of the society; 3. Craftsmen; 4. Merchants - who were disliked by many; and 5. Outcasts such as Ronin or exiled people or similar. The division is not definite and changes from book to book.
8. Neo-confucians believed in Confucian ideals but tried to rationalize them by removing religious ideas such as those in Taoism and Buddhism. For them, metaphysics were used to develop rational thought and were not a spiritual, religious concept.
9. Agriculture was lagging behind in development and people were poor. This led to severe famines that the shogunate could not solve. Two families managed to unite their armies and attack the Shogunate ending it and restoring the emperor as the ruler.
10. They decided to open up so that they could modernize since the western world had developed useful technology for agriculture and warfare. They wanted to improve conditions so they started trading with European forces again after 200 years. The pressure existed out of fear of being conquered by forces with vastly superior warfare technology.<span />