Vietnam
Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...
ese principality of the
Nguyễn lords
The Nguyễn lords (, 主阮; 1558–1777, 1780–1802), also known as the Nguyễn clan (; ), were Nguyễn dynasty's forerunner and a feudal noble clan ruling southern Đại Việt in the Revival Lê dynasty. The Nguyễn lords were membe ...
made contact.
He first arrived on the Vietnamese coast in 1585, with five ships, and began to engage in
pirate
Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and valuable goods, or taking hostages. Those who conduct acts of piracy are call ...
raids and coastal assaults. He was eventually driven off by a fleet of at least ten ships led by the sixth son of Lord Nguyễn Hoàng; two of the pirate ships were destroyed, and Shirahama fled. It is said that he was mistaken for a Westerner by the Vietnamese he encountered at the time.Li, Tana. ''Nguyen Cochinchina: Southern Vietnam in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries''. Ithaca:
Cornell University Press
The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University, an Ivy League university in Ithaca, New York. It is currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, maki ...
, 1998. pp60–61.
Fourteen years later, in 1599, Shirahama's craft was wrecked near the port of Thuận An. The local magistrate, correctly believing him to be some variety of pirate or
brigand
Brigandage is the life and practice of highway robbery and plunder. It is practiced by a brigand, a person who is typically part of a gang and lives by pillage and robbery.Oxford English Dictionary second edition, 1989. "Brigand.2" first record ...
, attacked Shirahama and was killed. Shirahama was then imprisoned, and Nguyễn Hoàng sent a missive to
Tokugawa Ieyasu
Tokugawa Ieyasu (born Matsudaira Takechiyo; 31 January 1543 – 1 June 1616) was the founder and first ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan, which ruled from 1603 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. He was the third of the three "Gr ...
, new ''
shōgun
, officially , was the title of the military rulers of Japan during most of the period spanning from 1185 to 1868. Nominally appointed by the Emperor, shoguns were usually the de facto rulers of the country, except during parts of the Kamak ...
'' of Japan, asking how to deal with Japanese sailors in the future. This was the first official contact between the two governments, and marked the beginning of a friendly relationship lasting several decades.