was an

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional ''daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was character ...

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

samurai were the hereditary military nobility and officer caste of History of Japan#Medieval Japan (1185–1573/1600), medieval and Edo period, early-modern Japan from the late 12th century until their abolition in 1876. They were the well-paid retai ...

, and the 9th ''

daimyō were powerful Japanese magnates, feudal lords who, from the 10th century to the early Meiji period in the middle 19th century, ruled most of Japan from their vast, hereditary land holdings. They were subordinate to the shogun and nominall ...

'' of

Kaga Domain The , also known as the , was a domain of the Tokugawa Shogunate of Japan during the Edo period from 1583 to 1871.

in the

Hokuriku region The was located in the northwestern part of Honshu, the main island of Japan. It lay along the Sea of Japan within the Chūbu region, which it is currently a part of. It is almost equivalent to Koshi Province and Hokurikudō area in pre-mod ...

of Japan. He was the 10th hereditary chieftain of the Kanazawa

Maeda clan was a Japanese samurai clan who occupied most of the Hokuriku region of central Honshū from the end of the Sengoku period through the Meiji restoration of 1868. The Maeda claimed descent from the Sugawara clan of Sugawara no Kiyotomo and Suga ...

. Shigemichi was born in

Kanazawa is the capital city of Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 466,029 in 203,271 households, and a population density of 990 persons per km2. The total area of the city was . Overview Cityscape File:もてな ...

as Kenjiro (健次郎), the seventh son of

Maeda Yoshinori was an Edo period Japanese samurai, and the 5th ''daimyō'' of Kaga Domain in the Hokuriku region of Japan. He was the 6th hereditary chieftain of the Kanazawa Maeda clan. Yoshinori was the third son of Maeda Tsunanori. His mother was a common ...

. His mother was a concubine and he was initially destined to be adopted by Kaga clan retainer Moirai Nagakata; however, with so many of his brother dying untimely deaths during the ''

O-Ie Sōdō O-Ie Sōdō (, "house strife") were noble family disputes within the samurai and aristocratic classes of Japan, particularly during the early Edo period (17th century). The most famous is the '' Date Sōdō'', which broke out among the Date family ...

'' known as the “Kaga Sōdō” these plans were cancelled. In 1753, he was named to succeed his brother Maeda Shigenobu and became ''daimyō'' the same year. He immediately prepared to depart for

Edo Edo ( ja, , , "bay-entrance" or "estuary"), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo. Edo, formerly a ''jōkamachi'' (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the ''de facto'' capital of ...

, but came down with measles (the same disease which had killed his brother), and his departure was delayed by a year. He was received in formal audience by Shogun Tokugawa Ieshige in 1754 and his posthumous adoption and position as ''daimyō'' was confirmed. One of his first steps was to end the “Kaga Sōdō” by siding firmly with the conservative faction, ending the fiscal experiments begun by Ōtsuki Denzō. While this purge brought political stability back to the domain, the domain finances immediately spiralled out of control. In 1759,

Kanazawa Castle is a large, partially-restored Japanese castle in Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan. It is located adjacent to the celebrated Kenroku-en Garden, which once formed the castle's private outer garden. It was the headquarters of Kaga Domain, r ...

burned down, along with much of the surrounding

castle town A castle town is a settlement built adjacent to or surrounding a castle. Castle towns were common in Medieval Europe. Some examples include small towns like Alnwick and Arundel, which are still dominated by their castles. In Western Europe, ...

, and to domain was forced to borrow 50,000 ''

ryō The was a gold currency unit in the shakkanhō system in pre- Meiji Japan. It was eventually replaced with a system based on the '' yen''. Origins The ''ryō'' was originally a unit of weight from China, the ''tael.'' It came into use in J ...

'' from the shogunate for immediate repairs. Sgigemichi was a noted patron of

Noh is a major form of classical Japanese dance-drama that has been performed since the 14th century. Developed by Kan'ami and his son Zeami, it is the oldest major theatre art that is still regularly performed today. Although the terms Noh and ...

and

Kyōgen is a form of traditional Japanese comic theater. It developed alongside '' Noh'', was performed along with ''Noh'' as an intermission of sorts between ''Noh'' acts on the same stage, and retains close links to ''Noh'' in the modern day; theref ...

drama. Shigemichi yielded headship to his half-brother Harunaga in 1771, and died in 1786 at age 44.

Family

*Father:

*Mother: Jitsujoin *Wife: Tokugawa Senmanhime, daughter of

Tokugawa Munemasa was a Japanese ''daimyō'' of the mid-Edo period, who ruled the Wakayama Domain. He was the son of Tokugawa Munenao, grandson of Matsudaira Yorizumi and great-grandson of Kishū Domain founder, Tokugawa Yorinobu. His childhood name was Naomatsu (� ...

Wakayama Domain Wakayama may refer to: *Wakayama Prefecture, a prefecture of Japan *Wakayama (city) Wakayama City Hall is the capital city of Wakayama Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 351,391 in 157066 househo ...

*Concubines: ** Oshun no Kata later Eshoin ** Omoyo no Kata later Shingetsuin ** Oyasu no Kata ** Tenrin’in ** Ohatsu no Kata later Shugetsuin *Children: ** Kunihime (1761-1771) by Oshun no Kata ** Eihime (1766-1801) married Matsudaira Katasada by Oshun no Kata ** daughter (1776) by Omoyo no Kata ** Maeda Naritaka (1778-1795) by Oyasu no Kata ** Fujihime married Matsudaira Yorinori (Takamatsu domain) by Tenrin’in ** Maeda Narinaga by Tenrin’in ** Son (1785) by Ohatsu no Kata

References

* Papinot, Edmond. (1948). ''Historical and Geographical Dictionary of Japan''. New York: Overbeck Co.

External links

Kaga Domain on "Edo 300 HTML"
(3 November 2007) 1741 births 1786 deaths People of Edo-period Japan Maeda clan Tozama daimyo {{Daimyo-stub