was a 16th century merchant in the Japanese port town of

Sakai is a city located in Osaka Prefecture, Japan. It has been one of the largest and most important seaports of Japan since the medieval era. Sakai is known for its '' kofun'', keyhole-shaped burial mounds dating from the fifth century. The ''kofun ...

, and a master of the tea ceremony. His ''

yagō , literally meaning "house name", is a term applied in traditional Japanese culture to Japanese name, names passed down within a guild, studio, or other circumstance other than blood relations. The term is synonymous with and . The term most ofte ...

'' was Naya.

Biography

A relative of the Amago and Sasaki samurai clans, Sōkyū originally came from

Yamato Province was a province of Japan, located in Kinai, corresponding to present-day Nara Prefecture in Honshū. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric (2005). "Yamato" in . It was also called . Yamato consists of two characters, 大 "great", and 和 " Wa". At first, th ...

. After settling in Sakai, he studied the tea ceremony under Takeno Jōō, eventually marrying Jōō's daughter and inheriting his teawares and lineage as a tea master. In his business, Sōkyū traded primarily in firearms and ammunition. Around 1554, after donating a large sum to the

Daitoku-ji is a Rinzai school Zen Buddhist temple in the Murasakino neighborhood of Kita-ku in the city of Kyoto Japan. Its ('' sangō'') is . The Daitoku-ji temple complex is one of the largest Zen temples in Kyoto, covering more than . In addition to ...

, he organized a shake-up in the local merchant circles by which he climbed into a position of considerable influence, and became a member of the city's leadership council. He traveled to the capital in 1568, where he met with warlord

Oda Nobunaga was a Japanese ''daimyō'' and one of the leading figures of the Sengoku period, Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods. He was the and regarded as the first "Great Unifier" of Japan. He is sometimes referred as the "Demon Daimyō" and "Demo ...

, and presented him with some tea accoutrements which had belonged to earlier masters. He thus earned Nobunaga's favor, and was granted a noble title. Shortly afterwards, when Nobunaga sought to lay claim to Sakai, many members of the council debated seeking defense from the Miyoshi clan, but Sōkyū was among those who suggested that the city submit. He acted as mediator to arrange the peaceful submission of the city, and was rewarded by Nobunaga with a lucrative commission to manufacture firearms for the

Oda clan The is a Japanese samurai family who were daimyo and an important political force in the unification of Japan in the mid-16th century. Though they reached the peak of their power under Oda Nobunaga and fell soon after, several branches of the ...

, and a post as a local magistrate. Sōkyū came to be responsible for tax collection in the outskirts of the city, and for pass-port applications and related matters. He was also assigned some jurisdiction over the nearby Tajima silver mine, and over the blacksmiths and metallurgists of the area, from whom he gathered materials to produce firearms and fireworks. Afterwards Sōkyū instructed Nobunaga in the ways of tea ceremony, also winning over the favor of

Toyotomi Hideyoshi , otherwise known as and , was a Japanese samurai and ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) of the late Sengoku period, Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods and regarded as the second "Great Unifier" of Japan.Richard Holmes, The World Atlas of Warfare: ...

. Sōkyū was present during the Grand Kitano Tea Ceremony of 1587, and served as one of Hideyoshi's three tea masters, alongside Sen no Rikyū and Tsuda Sōgyū. The same year, he helped prepare

lacquer Lacquer is a type of hard and usually shiny coating or finish applied to materials such as wood or metal. It is most often made from resin extracted from trees and waxes and has been in use since antiquity. Asian lacquerware, which may be c ...

for a massive wooden statue of the

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha (),* * * was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist legends, he was ...

which Hideyoshi saw constructed. Sōkyū passed on his business and his official post to his son,

Imai Sōkun was a prominent weapons merchant in the Japanese port town of Sakai, and master of the Japanese tea ceremony. He was also known by the names Imai Hiratsuna and Imai Kanehisa. Sōkun was the son of weapons merchant and tea master Imai Sōkyū, ...

, who would continue his father's legacy as tea master and advisor to Hideyoshi, and later 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 ...

. Sōkyū died in 1593, at the age of 73, leaving a number of books of memoirs and records. The Ōbaian, a teahouse related to him, still exists in Sakai's Daisen Park. Sōkyū is buried at the Rinkō-ji in Sakai.

References

*Frederic, Louis (2002). "Imai Sōkyū." Japan Encyclopedia. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. *Sansom, George (1961). ''A History of Japan: 1334-1615.'' Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. p345. {{DEFAULTSORT:Imai, Sokyu 1520 births 1593 deaths Japanese tea masters Samurai 16th-century Japanese businesspeople Japanese merchants