Rokugō ''kamiyashiki'' in Edo near Sensō-ji) in 1850 The was a Japanese samurai clan that claimed descent from the

Fujiwara clan was a powerful family of imperial regents in Japan, descending from the Nakatomi clan and, as legend held, through them their ancestral god Ame-no-Koyane. The Fujiwara prospered since the ancient times and dominated the imperial court until ...

and was based at Senboku County

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 ...

in the late

Sengoku period The was a period in Japanese history of near-constant civil war and social upheaval from 1467 to 1615. The Sengoku period was initiated by the Ōnin War in 1467 which collapsed the feudal system of Japan under the Ashikaga shogunate. Variou ...

. It should not be confused with a samurai clan of the same name which appears in early

Muromachi period The is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate (''Muromachi bakufu'' or ''Ashikaga bakufu''), which was officially established in 1338 by ...

records from

Musashi Province was a province of Japan, which today comprises Tokyo Metropolis, most of Saitama Prefecture and part of Kanagawa Prefecture. It was sometimes called . The province encompassed Kawasaki and Yokohama. Musashi bordered on Kai, Kōzuke, Sagami ...

. Rokugō Masanori (1567–1634) was rewarded by

Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and first ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa Shogunate of Japan, which ruled Japan from 1603 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. He was one of the three "Great Unifiers" of Japan, along with his former lord Oda Nobunaga and fel ...

for siding with the eastern armies in the

Battle of Sekigahara The Battle of Sekigahara ( Shinjitai: ; Kyūjitai: , Hepburn romanization: ''Sekigahara no Tatakai'') was a decisive battle on October 21, 1600 ( Keichō 5, 15th day of the 9th month) in what is now Gifu prefecture, Japan, at the end of ...

against his nominal overlords, the Onodera clan, by an increase in his holdings from 4,500 '' koku'' to 10,000 ''koku'' and the status of

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 ...

Hitachi-Fuchū Domain was a feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in Hitachi Province (modern-day Ibaraki Prefecture), Japan. It was centered on Fuchū Jin'ya in what is now the city of Ishioka, Ibaraki. It was also known as or ...

. He served the

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in ...

during the 1614

Siege of Osaka The was a series of battles undertaken by the Japanese Tokugawa shogunate against the Toyotomi clan, and ending in that clan's destruction. Divided into two stages (winter campaign and summer campaign), and lasting from 1614 to 1615, the siege ...

, and after the destruction of the

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 deriv ...

, was transferred to Honjō Domain with an increase in revenues to 20,000 ''koku'' which were all consolidated in the form of 103 villages in Yuki County where his descendants ruled for 11 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 practical imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Although there were r ...

."Honjo-han" on Edo 300 HTML
(accessed 15 August 2008) During the Boshin War of 1868–69, the Rokugō were signatories to the pact that formed 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 ...

, but were outgunned by the imperial forces subduing the alliance, and their home base,

Honjō Castle is a Japanese castle located in Yurihonjō, southern Akita Prefecture, Japan. At the end of the Edo period, Honjō Castle was home to the Rokugō clan, ''daimyō'' of Honjō Domain. The castle was also known as or . History Tateoka Mitsush ...

was destroyed during that conflict. As with all other ''daimyō'' families, the Rokugō clan was relieved of its title in 1871 by 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 ...

. The final ''daimyō'' of Honjō Domain was subsequently granted the ''

kazoku The was the hereditary peerage of the Empire of Japan, which existed between 1869 and 1947. They succeeded the feudal lords () and court nobles (), but were abolished with the 1947 constitution. Kazoku ( 華族) should not be confused with ...

'' peerage title of "shishaku" (

viscount A viscount ( , for male) or viscountess (, for female) is a title used in certain European countries for a noble of varying status. In many countries a viscount, and its historical equivalents, was a non-hereditary, administrative or judicia ...

).Karino, p. 41.List of Meiji-era Japanese nobility
/ref>

Notes

References

*Hoshi, Ryōichi (1997). ''Ōuetsu Reppandōmei''. Tokyo: Chūōkōron-shinsha.
"Honjo-han" on Edo 300 HTML
(accessed 5 January 2016)
List of Meiji-era Japanese nobility
(accessed 17 August 2008) *Sasaki, Suguru (2002). ''Boshin sensō: haisha no Meiji-ishin''. Tokyo: Chuōkōron-shinsha.
Rokugo clan genealogy
(accessed 5 January 2016) {{DEFAULTSORT:Rokugo Clan Japanese clans