Social Hierarchy
This was the highest social class in Tokugawa Japan, known as warriors who served their lords.
What is the samurai class?
This code of honour guided samurai behaviour and emphasized loyalty and duty.
What is Bushido?
Rice was important in Tokugawa Japan because it was used as this.
What is a measure of wealth/taxation?
Japan is made up of four main islands and is located off the coast of this continent.
What is Asia?
The Tokugawa period began in 1603 when this leader became shogun.
Who was Tokugawa Ieyasu?
This social class was made up of farmers, artisans, and merchants, and was below the samurai.
What is the commoner/peasant class?
Under Tokugawa law, peasants were required to stay in this occupation.
What is farming?
Because Japan has limited farmland, farmers often built these on hillsides to grow crops.
What are terraces?
This type of natural disaster frequently affects Japan due to its location on tectonic plate boundaries.
What are earthquakes?
This city became the political center of Tokugawa Japan and is now called Tokyo.
What is Edo?
Although they made money, this merchant class was considered low in status because they did not produce goods.
Who were the merchants?
This law required regional lords to spend every second year in the capital to prevent rebellion.
What is the alternate attendance system (sankin-kōtai)?
This natural resource was scarce in Japan, limiting tool and weapon production.
What is iron ore?
Mount Fuji is an example of this type of landform.
What is a volcano?
This policy limited foreign trade mainly to the Dutch and Chinese.
What is the policy of isolation (sakoku)?
This powerful military ruler controlled Japan while the emperor remained a symbolic figure.
Who was the shogun?
Christians were persecuted because Tokugawa leaders feared this about European influence.
What is that it threatened political control and loyalty to the shogun?
Due to limited natural resources, Japan relied heavily on this economic system within its borders.
What is domestic trade and local production?
Because much of Japan is mountainous, most people lived in these areas.
What are coastal plains?
The Tokugawa period ended after this foreign naval commander forced Japan to open trade in 1853.
Who was Matthew Perry?
This idea explains how the rigid four-level social system reflected the Tokugawa worldview about order and stability.
What is that strict social roles maintained peace, loyalty, and control by preventing social mobility and reinforcing Confucian ideas of hierarchy?
This idea explains how Tokugawa laws supported isolation and maintained centralized control.
What is that strict travel restrictions, class laws, and limits on foreign trade reduced outside influence and strengthened the shogun’s authority?
This idea explains how Japan’s limited resources influenced its decision to isolate itself.
What is that leaders wanted to control trade carefully to prevent dependence on foreign goods and protect stability?
This idea explains how Japan’s geography helped shape its isolation policy during the Tokugawa period.
Why did being an island nation with natural barriers make it easier to control borders and limit foreign contact?
This idea explains how foreign pressure and internal weaknesses led to the end of the Tokugawa shogunate.
What is the economic strain, unhappy samurai, and pressure from Western powers weakened the shogun’s control and led to political change?