How did people travel in the Tokugawa period? Was it purely for business or was there elements of sightseeing and tourism in their travel? In my graduation thesis, what started as a curiosity of the motives surrounding travel in past Japan, examining the different actors in play and how they affected and reacted to one another, led me to question whether or not the bakufu and daimyo authorities were really against the travel of commoners.
Related Research
My 2022 project study paper looks into why and how the peasants of the Tokugawa period were left with a surplus after paying their rice tax, a key factor in the economic growth of Japan.
Why the Tokugawa Shogunate Did Not Optimize the Land Tax
This image from the ukiyo-e woodcut print series “The Fifty-three Stations of Tokaido (東海道五十三次)” is a visual representation of travel during the Edo period, and was the impetus for my research.
Reference :
Andō Hiroshige (Japanese painter and printmaker, 1797-1858). 東海道五十三次.
The diversity of travel can be noticed by the many classes that appear to be stopping at this roadside establishment for refreshment. We see a katana holding man who likely is of the samurai class, a traveling woman and two men who appear to be of the farmer or lower class. These type of portrayals, along with numerous travel diaries, reveal that travel was not limited to class and power, but something that appears to have been undertaken by individuals from all levels of society.
Articles of note:
- The Tōkaidō Road: Journeys through Japanese Books and Prints in the Collections of Princeton University
- Cultured Travelers and Consumer Tourists in Edo-Period Sagami
- The “Spatial Vernacular” in Tokugawa Maps