Tokugawa Ieyasu

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Tokugawa Ieyasu

Q: What was Tokugawa Ieyasu’s childhood like?

Tokugawa Ieyasu was separated from his parents at an early age. His mother was forced to leave the household because of shifting clan alliances, and, when he was four years old, Ieyasu was sent as a hostage to the Imagawa clan. En route, he was captured by the rival Oda family and held for two years.

Q: Where did Tokugawa Ieyasu grow up?

Tokugawa Ieyasu spent his early life in Sumpu (now Shizuoka ) as a hostage of the Imagawa clan. There he received military and leadership training and, by his teen years, was acting as a lieutenant for clan leader Imagawa Yoshimoto. Imagawa was slain when Ieyasu was 17, and Ieyasu returned to his family home near Nagoya .

Q: What were Tokugawa Ieyasu’s achievements?

Tokugawa Ieyasu possessed a combination of organizational genius and military aptitude that allowed him to assert control of a unified Japan . As a result, his family presided over a period of peace, internal stability, and relative isolation from the outside world for more than 250 years.

Q: Where is Tokugawa Ieyasu buried?

Tokugawa Ieyasu was buried at Kunōzan Tōshō-gū, a Shintō shrine in eastern Shizuoka. One year after his death, a second shrine was erected at Nikkō , and it is held that Ieyasu's spirit resides there.

shogun of Japan

Also known as: Matsudaira Motoyasu, Matsudaira Takechiyo

Written by Conrad D. Totman

Fact-checked by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Last Updated: Apr 11, 2024 • Article History

Tokugawa Ieyasu

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Category: History & Society

Original name:: Matsudaira Takechiyo

Also called:: Matsudaira Motoyasu

Born:: Jan. 31, 1543, Okazaki, Japan

Died:: June 1, 1616, Sumpu (aged 73)

Notable Family Members:: son Tokugawa Hidetada

Role In:: Battle of Sekigahara

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What was Tokugawa Ieyasu’s childhood like?

Where did Tokugawa Ieyasu grow up?

What were Tokugawa Ieyasu’s achievements?

Where is Tokugawa Ieyasu buried?

Tokugawa Ieyasu (born Jan. 31, 1543, Okazaki, Japan—died June 1, 1616, Sumpu) was the founder of the last shogunate in Japan—the Tokugawa, or Edo, shogunate (1603–1867). Ieyasu was born into the family of a local warrior situated several miles east of modern Nagoya, one of many such families struggling to survive in a brutal age of endemic civil strife. His childhood was scarcely auspicious. His father, Matsudaira Hirotada, was involved in a network of shifting alliances that repeatedly drew him into battle. When Ieyasu was two years old, his mother was permanently separated from his father’s family because of one ...(100 of 1730 words)

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