was a king of the

Ryukyu Kingdom The Ryukyu Kingdom was a kingdom in the Ryukyu Islands from 1429 to 1879. It was ruled as a Tributary system of China, tributary state of Ming dynasty, imperial Ming China by the King of Ryukyu, Ryukyuan monarchy, who unified Okinawa Island t ...

. He succeeded

Shō Nei was king of the Ryukyu Kingdom from 1589 to 1620. He reigned during the 1609 invasion of Ryukyu and was the first king of Ryukyu to be a vassal to the Shimazu clan of Satsuma, a Japanese feudal domain. Shō Nei was the great-grandson of Sh� ...

, whose reign saw the

invasion of Ryukyu The by forces of the Japanese feudal domain of Satsuma took place from March to May of 1609, and marked the beginning of the Ryukyu Kingdom's status as a vassal state under the Satsuma domain. The invasion force was met with stiff resistanc ...

by Japanese forces in 1609 and the subjugation of the kingdom to

Satsuma Domain The , briefly known as the , was a Han system, domain (''han'') of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan during the Edo period from 1600 to 1871. The Satsuma Domain was based at Kagoshima Castle in Satsuma Province, the core of the modern city of ...

, and ruled from 1621 until 1640.

Life

Shō Hō was the fourth son of Shō Kyū, the third son of King

Shō Gen was king of the Ryukyu Kingdom from 1556 to 1572. He was called "Gen, the mute."Kerr, George H. (2000). Life The king required considerable support from the ''Sanshikan'' (Council of Three), the chief council of royal advisors. His reign ma ...

. In 1616, he was appointed '' kokushō'',"Shō Hō." ''Okinawa konpakuto jiten'' (沖縄コンパクト事典, "Okinawa Compact Encyclopedia")
Ryukyu Shimpo
(琉球新報). 1 March 2003. Accessed 12 February 2009. a high government position akin to

prime minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

or chief royal advisor, which would later be replaced with ''

sessei was the highest government post of the Ryūkyū Kingdom below the king; the ''sessei'' served the function of royal or national advisor. In the Ryukyuan languages, Ryukyuan language at the time, the pronunciation was closer to ''shisshii'', and h ...

''. Three years later, Shō Hō was named Prince of Nakagusuku and given Nakagusuku ''

magiri The administrative divisions of the Ryukyu Kingdom were a hierarchy composed of districts, ''magiri'', or cities, villages, and islands established by the Ryukyu Kingdom throughout the Ryukyu Islands. Divisions There were three or ''hō'': , , ...

'' as his domain. King Shō Nei died without an heir in 1621, and Shō Hō was selected to succeed him. As the first king to be enthroned since Satsuma's invasion in 1609, formal permission and acknowledgment of the king's authority and legitimacy was required before performing the coronation ceremony, sending heralds to China, and assuming the responsibilities of the throne. In addition, while Shō Hō retained powers related to organization of offices and administration of punishments, along with all the ritual prestige of the throne, Shō Nei was the last king of Ryukyu to rule personally, directly, and absolutely as monarch. Much of the decisions and behavior of Shō Hō's government were subject to Satsuma's approval. Relations with China were also strained. At the start of Shō Hō's reign, Okinawan

tribute A tribute (; from Latin ''tributum'', "contribution") is wealth, often in kind, that a party gives to another as a sign of submission, allegiance or respect. Various ancient states exacted tribute from the rulers of lands which the state con ...

ships were only welcome in

Fuzhou Fuzhou is the capital of Fujian, China. The city lies between the Min River (Fujian), Min River estuary to the south and the city of Ningde to the north. Together, Fuzhou and Ningde make up the Eastern Min, Mindong linguistic and cultural regi ...

once every ten years. The Chinese Imperial Court had reduced the tribute missions to this frequency following the Japanese invasion in 1609, claiming that it was done in consideration of the instability and poverty that the chaos of the invasion must have brought to the kingdom. In fact, these tribute missions, the only legal method of trading with

Ming China The Ming dynasty, officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming was the last imperial dynasty of ...

, were essential to the kingdom's economic prosperity. Therefore, in 1623, when

investiture Investiture (from the Latin preposition ''in'' and verb ''vestire'', "dress" from ''vestis'' "robe") is a formal installation or ceremony that a person undergoes, often related to membership in Christian religious institutes as well as Christian kn ...

missions were exchanged, the Ryukyuan officials pushed for a return to the system of sending tribute every other year; it was decided that missions would be allowed once every five years.Kerr. p180. After a twenty-year reign, Shō Hō died in 1640, and was succeeded by his son, Shō Ken.

Notes

References

* Kerr, George H. (1965). ''Okinawa, the History of an Island People.'' Rutland, Vermont: C.E. Tuttle Co
OCLC 39242121
* Smits, Gregory. (1999)
''Visions of Ryukyu: Identity and Ideology in Early-Modern Thought and Politics,''
Honolulu:

University of Hawaii Press A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Uni ...

.
OCLC 39633631
* Suganuma, Unryu. (2000). ''Sovereign Rights and Territorial Space in Sino-Japanese Relations: Irredentism and the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands.'' Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. ;
OCLC 170955369
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sho Ho Second Shō dynasty Kings of Ryūkyū Sessei 1590 births 1640 deaths

Life

See also

Notes

References