This dissertation explores as sites of meaning-making the ritual activities of embassies dispatched by the Okinawan kingdom of Lūchū to the court of the Tokugawa shoguns in Edo (Tokyo) on seventeen occasions between 1644 to 1850. Through a combination of ritual elements from Ming/Qing, samurai, and Lūchūan court ceremonial traditions, these embassies served to ritually enact the kingdom’s situational political/cultural position within the region as a distinct Confucian kingdom both recognized as a sovereign kingdom and loyal tributary by the Ming and Qing imperial courts and claimed as belonging to or being under the banners of the Shimazu samurai house, lords of Kagoshima domain in southern Japan. This was accomplished chiefly in processions performed by the embassies in the streets and waterways of Japan, formal audiences with the Tokugawa shoguns, and receptions prepared for the embassies by local authorities, as well as through a number of other aspects of the embassies’ journeys and activities while in Japan.

Remarkable consistency is seen in the ritual forms practiced by both the Lūchūan embassies and by those receiving them. By parading in the same fashion as in previous embassies, wearing the same costumes, employing the same banners and ritual accoutrements, exchanging the same categories and volumes of gifts, and otherwise adhering to precedent and concepts of ritual propriety, Lūchūan embassies and their samurai counterparts ritually maintained relationships of a consistent character. Most of these ritual elements were not Tokugawa period innovations but were already standard elements of Lūchūan court ritual or Lūchūan-Japanese ceremonial interactions prior to the 1609 Shimazu invasion of kingdom. The continuity across this 1609 turning point shows that the form and style of these Lūchūan embassies was not designed and imposed by either the Shimazu or the Tokugawa for politically strategic reasons as part of a new 17th century form of foreign relations, but rather was in meaningful ways a continuation of established modes of ritual diplomatic interactions. Examination of these ritual forms also reveals that while the Tokugawa regime appropriated or adapted the logic and rhetoric of the so-called “Sinocentric world order” or “tribute system”, using embassies from Lūchū and Joseon Korea to form discourses or conceptions of a shogun-centric tributary world order, the ritual forms employed were based heavily on samurai customs, thus incorporating Lūchū and Joseon into a shogun-centered order which was also grounded in samurai networks and hierarchies of warrior houses linked to one another by individual or familial fealty.

ABSTRACT

Wind, Forest, Fire, and Mountain 風林火山: The Evolution of Environmental Management and Local Society in Central Japan, 1450-1650

by

John Elijah Bender

What role did contests over environment play in the large scale transition from war to peace during Japan’s long sixteenth century? This study examines the question by focusing upon how people dealt with environmental challenges and disputes during an age of instability, institutional failure, and war. Japan’s late medieval (ca. 1450-1600) environmental management regime underwent important changes that proved crucial in ending a long period of warfare and formed the basis of an even longer era of stability. The construction of stable patterns of environmental management depended upon a significant increase in de facto local autonomy, coupled with the rise of authoritarian regional states. Although these developments sometimes stood in opposition to one another, they ultimately combined to reorganize the environmental management regime in Kai and Shinano Provinces.

Central Japan became a crossroads of multiple struggles during the late medieval period. The Takeda warrior house of Kai Province eventually emerged from a pool of contenders to claim supremacy in the region in the first few decades of the sixteenth century. Like other regional magnates (daimyo), the Takeda had an interest in ending warfare and tapping into local productivity within their territory. They did so in ways that effectively turned the Takeda into local patrons who had the means to act as a guarantor of local interests. Communities had been largely forced to fend for themselves during the civil war, or Warring States, era (1467-1600). As a result, they developed administrative and defensive procedures independently. The Takeda worked to integrate these communities by leaving most of those local practices in place, deputizing a class of officials, and negotiating set tax rates on local production. Residents did surrender some of their prerogatives, but collectively gained a more favorable institutional framework. Takeda and their officials were able to mediate local disputes, something that previously could only be done by two parties directly, often resulting in violence. Crucially, the Takeda possessed the wherewithal to enforce dispute settlements. They also supported regional infrastructure projects and policies that required various communities to coordinate certain management practices. These projects ultimately increased efficiency, and linked villages in ways that created a set of complimentary interests between different socioeconomic classes.

The development of complimentary interests in turn created a vested interest in maintaining new sociopolitical relationships. As these bonds strengthened, they became more regularized, more reliable, and more stable. This gave added momentum towards the reestablishment of order at the close of the sixteenth century. The local settlements worked out at this time remained the basis of local administration well into the early modern period. Forged as they were over generations of upheaval, these practices favored maintenance of stability over other concerns. Often, that entailed relatively hands-off treatment from political superiors. The flexibility between the authoritarian discourse of samurai rule, and the actual latitude afforded local communities in their affairs, significantly contributed to the remarkable durability of the Tokugawa system.