Mikasa (prince)

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Prince Mikasa (1958)

Prince Mikasa (Takahito) of Japan ( Japanese 三 笠 宮 崇仁 親王 , Mikasa-no-miya Takahito-shinnō; born December 2, 1915 in Tokyo ; † October 27, 2016 ibid) was the fourth and youngest son of the Japanese emperor Taishō and of the Empress Teimei . He was the younger brother of Emperor Hirohito and the last surviving uncle of Emperor Akihito . The prince served as an officer in the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II , and after the war he established himself as a scholar and lecturer in Middle East studies and Semitic languages. His official title was "Prince" (Jap. 親王Shinno ), his title of "His Highness" (Jap. 殿下Denka ).

Early years

The four sons of Emperor Taishō in 1921: Hirohito, Takahito, Nobuhito and Yasuhito

Prince Takahito was born in the Tokyo Imperial Palace . In his childhood he was called Sumi-no-miya . From 1922 to 1932 he attended the boys' elementary school of the Gakushuin schools . By the time he attended secondary school, his brother had already ascended the chrysanthemum throne, and his other two brothers, Princes Chichibu and Takamatsu , had made careers in the Imperial Japanese Army and the Imperial Japanese Navy , respectively . In 1932 he enrolled at the Imperial Military Academy and was assigned to the Fifth Cavalry Regiment as a second lieutenant in June 1936. On reaching the age of majority in December 1935, the emperor granted him the title of Mikasa-no-miya (Prince Mikasa) and permission to found a new branch of the Japanese imperial family .

military service

Prince Mikasa was promoted to first lieutenant in 1937 , to captain in 1939 and to major in 1941. He served from January 1943 to January 1944 as a staff officer at the Japanese Expeditionary Army Headquarters in Nanjing , Republic of China . He then served as a staff officer in the army division of the Imperial General Headquarters in Tokyo until the Japanese defeat in August 1945.

family

On October 22, 1941, Prince Mikasa married Takagi Yoriko, the second daughter of Takagi Masanori. The couple had five children, two of whom were still alive at the time of Mikasa's death. The couple's two daughters left the Japanese imperial family by marriage due to the provisions of the Imperial Household Act (皇室 典範, kōshitsu tenpan) of 1947 :

  1. Konoe Yasuko, formerly Princess Yasuko of Mikasa, born April 26, 1944, married on December 16, 1966 to Konoe Tadateru , the younger brother of the former Prime Minister Hosokawa Morihiro and adopted grandson and heir of the former Prime Minister Konoe Fumimaro , the current President of the Japanese Red Cross .
  2. Prince Tomohito of Mikasa (January 5, 1946 - June 6, 2012)
  3. Prince Katsura (Yoshihito) (born February 11, 1948 - † June 8, 2014)
  4. Sen Masako , formerly Princess Masako of Mikasa, born October 23, 1951, married on October 14, 1983 to Sen Masayuki, the eldest son of Sen Shoshitu XV and currently the sixteenth Hereditary Grand Master ( iemoto ) of the Urasenke tea ceremony school
  5. Prince Takamado (Norihito) (born December 29, 1954 - November 21, 2002)

post war period

Prince Mikasa (1946)

After World War II, Prince Mikasa enrolled in the literary faculty of the University of Tokyo, studying archeology, Middle Eastern studies, and Semitic languages. From 1954 he was director of the Japanese Society for Middle East Studies. He was honorary president of the Japanese Society for Orientology and was a guest of the German Society for Nature and Ethnology of East Asia on various occasions . (OAG) . Prince Mikasa has been a visiting professor at various universities in Japan and abroad, including the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music, the Tokyo Christian Women's University, the University of London, the University of Hokkaido and the University of Shizuoka.

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1975 .

Prince Mikasa last lived with his wife in the Akasaka Palace and rarely appeared in public. He was in a wheelchair and, according to his own statements, continued to follow the news and prayed for “the happiness of all people”.

On May 16, 2016, Prince Mikasa was admitted to St. Luke's International Hospital (Japanese 聖 路加 国際 病院Seirukakokusaibyōin ) in the Tokyo district of Chūō due to pneumonia , from which he recovered after a month. However, since heart problems arose, he was not released from the hospital. There, after 75 years of marriage, he celebrated the crown jewel wedding with his wife on October 22nd . On the morning of October 27, 2016 at around 7:40 a.m. local time , his condition worsened. At 8:34 a.m., Prince Mikasa died at the age of 100 after a cardiac arrest . Emperor Akihito announced a week of mourning and said u. a. the annual autumn celebration in the garden of the Imperial Palace (Japanese 秋 の 園 遊 会Aki no En'yūkai ) and a meeting with the Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte . The funeral took place on November 4th in the Bunkyō district. A total of over 600 guests took part; including leading politicians such as Prime Minister Shinzō Abe and Caroline Kennedy , United States Ambassador to Japan.

Web links

Commons : Mikasa (Prince)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Reiji Yoshida: Prince Mikasa, brother of Emperor Hirohito and a voice for peace, dies at 100 . In: The Japan Times , October 27, 2016, accessed October 27, 2016.
  2. ^ Weegmann and Schinzinger: The history of the OAG - 1873 to 1980 -. German Society for Nature and Ethnology of East Asia - OAG -; 1982.
  3. ↑ Prince Mikasa, Emperor Akihito's uncle, turns 100 . Kyodo article in the Japan Times , December 2, 2015, accessed October 29, 2016.
  4. ↑ 三 笠 宮 さ ま ご 逝去 百合 子 さ ま が み と ら れ る ANN News , October 26, 2016, accessed October 29, 2016 (Japanese, YouTube video, 1:07 minutes).
  5. ↑ 天皇 陛下 、 7 日間 の 喪 に 秋 の 園 遊 会 も 取 り や め ANN News , October 27, 2016, accessed October 29, 2016 (Japanese, YouTube video, 0:39 minutes).
  6. ↑ Prince Mikasa laid to rest in Imperial rite Kyodo article in the Japan Times, November 4, 2016, accessed November 5, 2016 (English)
personal data
SURNAME Mikasa
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 三 笠 宮 崇仁 (Japanese)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION japanese prince
DATE OF BIRTH December 2, 1915
PLACE OF BIRTH Tokyo
DATE OF DEATH October 27, 2016
Place of death Tokyo