The Port of Uraga: Tokugawa Japan’s Choke Point to Edo

The Port of Uraga: Tokugawa Japan’s Choke Point to Edo

Until the opening of Japan in the mid-nineteenth century, Uraga had been a port with both commercial and military significance on a domestic level arguably for the duration of the Edo period (1603-1868). Its international importance, however, lies in the initial years of the period (1603-1638), with considerable documentation showing a flourishing trade with Spain. Never before or after had a European superpower traded with eastern Japan until the nation industrialised during the Meiji period (1868-1912). The intent of this research has been to shed light on a period in Japanese maritime history that has remained overlooked to a large extent for over four hundred years with regards to the circumstances of its development and further growth, despite its overwhelming importance, using both archival and archaeological evidence from both Europe as well as Japan. This evidence suggests that the establishment of Uraga as a commercial and later diplomatic choke point with Spain was initiated and managed by William Adams under the auspices of Tokugawa Ieyasu, and that subsequent utilisation of the port as a point of controlled entry to Edo bay was the convention domestically as well until the end of the Edo period. With this trade, we see that the normal colonial relations Europe had over Asian ports had no hold on Japan. On the contrary, this paper puts forth the idea that Japan was successful at staving off such attempts due to Adams’ intercedence, producing a pattern of entanglement with the West that lasts to this day.

T. Michael Perrin

The Museum of Underwater Archaeology

November 2021

Enlish

Perrin, T. Michael. 2021. “The Port of Uraga: Tokugawa Japan’s Choke Point to Edo.” Edited by Brian Fahy, Hans
Van Tilburg, Bill Jeffery, T. Kurt Knoerl, and Riley Smith. In Proceedings of Fourth Asia Pacific Regional Conference
on Underwater Cultural Heritage: Keelung,Taiwan, and Virtual, November 1-5, 2021. The Museum of Underwater
Archaeology URL: https://apconf-much.org/proceedings/exhibits/show/apconf-muchproceedings/item/675

Asia Pacific Regional Conference on Underwater Cultural Heritage