was a feudal domain in

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

Japan, located in

Dewa Province was a province of Japan comprising modern-day Yamagata Prefecture and Akita Prefecture, except for the city of Kazuno and the town of Kosaka. Dewa bordered on Mutsu and Echigō Provinces. Its abbreviated form name was . History Early per ...

(modern-day

Akita Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu.Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "Provinces and prefectures" in ; "Tōhoku" in . Its population is estimated 915,691 as of 1 August 2023 and its geographi ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. It was centered on Kameda Castle in what is now the city of Yurihonjō, Akita.

History

Much of

was controlled by the powerful

Mogami clan were Japanese ''daimyōs'', and were a branch of the Ashikaga family. In the Sengoku period, they were the Sengoku ''daimyōs'' who ruled Dewa Province which is now Yamagata Prefecture and part of Akita Prefecture. The Mogami clan is derived ...

during the

Sengoku period The was the period in History of Japan, Japanese history in which civil wars and social upheavals took place almost continuously in the 15th and 16th centuries. The Kyōtoku incident (1454), Ōnin War (1467), or (1493) are generally chosen as th ...

. However, the Mogami were dispossessed by the

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. The Tokugawa shogunate was established by Tokugawa Ieyasu after victory at the Battle of Sekigahara, ending the civil wars ...

in 1622, with the majority of their holdings going to the

Satake clan The was a Japanese clan, Japanese samurai clan that claimed descent from the Minamoto clan. Its first power base was in Hitachi Province. The clan was subdued by Minamoto no Yoritomo in the late 12th century, but later entered Yoritomo's serv ...

, who were transferred from

Hitachi Province was an old provinces of Japan, old province of Japan in the area of Ibaraki Prefecture.Louis Frédéric, Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''Hitachi fudoki''" in . It was sometimes called . Hitachi Province bordered on Shimōsa Province, S ...

, to their new (and much smaller) holdings at

Kubota Domain was a Han (Japan), feudal domain in Edo period Japan, located in Dewa Province (modern-day Akita Prefecture), Japan. It was centered on Kubota Castle in what is now the city of Akita, Akita, Akita and was thus also known as the . It was governe ...

. The Iwaki clan originally ruled a 120,000 ''

koku The is a Chinese-based Japanese unit of volume. One koku is equivalent to 10 or approximately , or about of rice. It converts, in turn, to 100 shō and 1,000 gō. One ''gō'' is the traditional volume of a single serving of rice (before co ...

'' domain in the

Hamadōri is the easternmost of the three regions of Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, the other two being Nakadōri in the central area of the prefecture and Aizu in the west. Hamadōri is bordered by the Abukuma Highlands to the west and the Pacific Ocean t ...

region of southeast Mutsu Province since the

Kamakura period The is a period of History of Japan, Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura, Kanagawa, Kamakura by the first ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo after the conclusion of the G ...

, and had established close ties to both the

Date clan The is a Japanese samurai kin group.Edmond Papinot, Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon''; Papinot, (2003)"Date", ''Nobiliare du Japon'', p. 5 retrieved 2013-5-5. History The Date fam ...

Sendai is the capital Cities of Japan, city of Miyagi Prefecture and the largest city in the Tōhoku region. , the city had a population of 1,098,335 in 539,698 households, making it the List of cities in Japan, twelfth most populated city in Japan. ...

and the

Hitachi () is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in 1910 and headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo. The company is active in various industries, including digital systems, power and renewable ener ...

during the late

. Although the Iwaki clan sided with

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 ...

at the

Battle of Sekigahara The Battle of Sekigahara (Shinjitai: ; Kyūjitai: , Hepburn romanization: ''Sekigahara no Tatakai'') was an important battle in Japan which occurred on October 21, 1600 (Keichō 5, 15th day of the 9th month) in what is now Gifu Prefecture, ...

, due to their close familial ties with

Satake Yoshinobu was a ''daimyō'' in Sengoku period and early Edo period Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate and the 19th head of the Satake clan and 1st ''daimyō'' of Kubota Domain in Dewa Province. His courtesy title was '' Sakon-no-e-shōshō'', later '' ...

, they refused to participate in attack Ieyasu ordered on

Uesugi Kagekatsu was a Japanese samurai ''daimyō'' during the Sengoku and Edo periods. He was the adopted son of Uesugi Kenshin and Uesugi Kagetora’s brother in law. Early life and rise Kagekatsu was the son of Nagao Masakage, the head of the Ueda Naga ...

Aizuwakamatsu is a city in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 118,159 in 50,365 households, and a population density of 310 persons per km2. The total area of the city was . History The area of present-day Aizuwakamatsu ...

and were consequently dispossessed of their holdings. In 1616, the

relented, and allowed the clan to have the 10,000 ''

'' Shinano Nakamura Domain. In 1623, Iwaki Yoshitaka was transferred to the newly created 20,000 ''koku'' Kameda Domain, a compact holding consisting of 71 villages in Yuki County where his descendants ruled for 13 generations to the

Meiji restoration The , referred to at the time as the , and also known as the Meiji Renovation, Revolution, Regeneration, Reform, or Renewal, was a political event that restored Imperial House of Japan, imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Althoug ...

. Relations remained very strong between with the Satake clan, almost to the extent that Kameda Domain became a semi-subsidiary domain of

. This drew unfavorable attention from the Tokugawa shogunate, and in 1718, when Iwaki Hidetaka died, his successor was selected from a branch of the Date clan. Ties between the Iwaki and Date clans strengthened over the next several generations. The domain had a population of 23,894 people in 4356 households per the 1869 census. The clan maintained its primary residence (''kamiyashiki'') in

Edo Edo (), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo. Edo, formerly a (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the '' de facto'' capital of Japan from 1603 as the seat of the Tokugawa shogu ...

at Daidokoro-cho, in Koishikawa.Edo daimyo.net
During the

Boshin war The , sometimes known as the Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War, was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a coalition seeking to seize political power in the name of the Impe ...

, Kameda Domain remained a member of the

Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei The was a Japanese military-political coalition established and disestablished over the course of several months in early to mid-1868 during the Boshin War. Its flag was either a white interwoven five-pointed star on a black field, or a black ...

; even after Kubota Domain switched sides. Despite its meager military resources, the domain fought against the forces of pro-Imperial

Shinjō Domain was a Japanese Han (Japan), domain of the Edo period, located in Dewa Province Japan and ruled by the Tozawa clan. It was centered on Shinjō Castle in what is now the city of Shinjō, Yamagata and occupied all of what is now Mogami District, Yam ...

until an agreement was reached. The new

Meiji government The was the government that was formed by politicians of the Satsuma Domain and Chōshū Domain in the 1860s. The Meiji government was the early government of the Empire of Japan. Politicians of the Meiji government were known as the Meiji ...

penalized the domain with a reduction in revenues to 18,000 ''koku''. With the

abolition of the han system The in the Empire of Japan and its replacement by a system of prefectures in 1871 was the culmination of the Meiji Restoration begun in 1868, the starting year of the Meiji period. Under the reform, all daimyos (, ''daimyō'', feudal lords) ...

in July 1871, and the absorption of Kameda Domain into Akita Prefecture, the final daimyō of Kameda, Iwaki Takakuni, relocated to Tokyo. In 1884, he and his descendants were granted the title of

viscount A viscount ( , for male) or viscountess (, for female) is a title used in certain European countries for a noble of varying status. The status and any domain held by a viscount is a viscounty. In the case of French viscounts, the title is ...

(''shishaku'') in the ''

kazoku The was the hereditary peerage of the Empire of Japan, which existed between 1869 and 1947. It was formed by merging the feudal lords (''Daimyo, daimyō'') and court nobles (''kuge'') into one system modelled after the British peerage. Distin ...

'' peerage.

List of daimyō

Iwaki clan (''tozama'') 1623-1871

External links

Kameda on "Edo 300 HTML"

Notes

{{Authority control Domains of Japan 1623 establishments in Japan States and territories established in 1623 1871 disestablishments in Japan States and territories disestablished in 1871 Dewa Province History of Akita Prefecture Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei

History

List of daimyō

Further reading

External links

Notes