Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of the Tokugawa Institute for the History of Forestry
Special Exhibition Rule and Ritual: The Shogun and the Owari Tokugawa Family

Chapter 1
Ieyasu and Yoshinao

Tokugawa Yoshinao (1600-50), the first Lord of Owari, was born the ninth son of future Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu in the Eleventh Month of 1600. When Yoshinao was eight years old, he was bestowed the province of Owari, but did not move there immediately due to his young age and instead was brought up under Ieyasu's care.
Yoshinao was first in line to succeed to the shogunate in the event that something should happen to his elder brother Hidetada (later the second shogun). However, after Ieyasu's death and the establishment of shogunal authority under Hidetada, Yoshinao was called upon to become the top daimyo in the land. Although he was still a step above the other feudal lords, under the third shogun, Iemitsu, his former title of "Owari-sama" was changed to "Owari-dono," reflecting a growing distancing from the shogun. Later, the heads of the Owari family were in the position of pledging fealty to the shogunal family.

Chapter 2
Duties of the Tokugawa Shogun

This section examines four important responsibilities of the shogun. First, he promulgated the Laws for the Military Houses and issued domanial land assignments to the feudal lords. These activities served to confirm the shogun's lord-vassal relationships with the daimyos and were among the most important political affairs conducted by the shogun. Second, he received audiences from the daimyos. These audiences were conducted according to detailed regulations and had the effect of reinforcing shogunal authority. Third, he received delegations of foreign envoys toward the end of the Tokugawa shogunate. As the representative of Japan, it was the shogun's duty to negotiate with foreign envoys and make policy decisions based on those meetings. Fourth, the shogun collected information, sometimes widely, sometimes secretly, in order to make informed decisions on governmental affairs.
Some of the shogun's activities were conducted in the public realm (in terms of political and ceremonial spaces) when he attended annual events and made related appearances. On an everyday basis, the shogun operated in private office and living quarters of the inner castle, where the majority of his political affairs were usually conducted. For this reason, he had political advisors who acted as intermediaries between the public and private spaces of the shogunal operations.

Chapter 3
Gifts Exchanged between the Shogun and the Owari Daimyos

The exchange of gifts was an indispensable custom for facilitating smooth political, economic, and interpersonal relations. Feudal lords presented the shogun with gifts of local produce from season to season so that they would not be forgotten in this era free of the demands of warfare.
For his part, the shogun bestowed gifts of gold, silver, clothing, and other items on daimyos when they served their military duty on shogunal construction projects or when they presented gifts of money to the shogunate. Swords, in particular, were the most prized of these gifts.

Chapter 4
Duties of the Owari Daimyo

The work of the head of the Owari family was wide-ranging. This section will address three main categories of duties. First, he had to keep track of what was happening in the domain. The daimyo would tour his territory, accompanied by an entourage of vassals in order to assert his authority over his subjects, while at the same time observing the state of his domain first-hand. Second, he held audiences with his vassals. Vassals were strictly ranked according to their status and post. Official audiences were the place where these distinctions were clearly demonstrated. Third, he regulated the activities of his vassals. As head of the family, the daimyo had a large number of vassals. He appointed these vassals to official posts and assigned them positions to support his governance of his domain.

Chapter 5
The Shogun and the Owari Daimyo in the Late Edo and Meiji Periods

As the senior of the three cadet branches of the Tokugawa family, the Owari Tokugawa originally stood in a position of direct support of the shogun. However, amidst the turmoil accompanying the end of the Edo period, the 14th Lord of Owari, Tokugawa Yoshikatsu opposed Ii Naosuke, the chief councillor to the shogun, and was consequently forced into hiding and subjected to house arrest. Also, during the First Chōshū Expedition, Yoshikatsu acted counter to the expectations of the shogunate, settling the dispute with minimal sacrifice rather than forcing Chōshū into submissions, so the Owari did not necessarily always act in accordance with the intentions of the shogun or shogunate.
Moreover, the Owari family took part in the political upheaval to restore imperial power and the major role they played in the establishment of the new Meiji government as well as their efforts to entice the new government forces to pledge themselves to the emperor were considered a betrayal of the shogun.
However, the Owari had not abandoned the shogun. The peaceful and bloodless surrender of Edo Castle can in part be credited to the Owari family's persuasive appeals to the shogun. It was rather because the Owari family stood on the side of the new government that it was possible for them to take such actions, and it can be said that these actions, though implicit, were in fact taken on the shogun's behalf. It is in such actions that we can see the significance of the Owari family during the final days of the Tokugawa Shogunate and the Meiji Restoration.

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