Yoshida Toyo

Yoshida Toyo

Yoshida Tōyō ( Japanese 吉田 東洋 , actually Yoshida Masaaki (吉田 正 秋); born 1816 in Kōchi ( Kōchi Prefecture ); died May 6, 1862 in Kōchi) was a Japanese samurai and reformer of the administration of the Tosa domain .

life and work

Yoshida Tōyō received in 1853 from the daimyō Yamauchi Yōdō (山 内 容 堂; 1827-1872) a high position in the administration of the Tosa domain. He then began a series of reforms, but then had to resign because of opposition from conservative circles. However, in 1857 he was hired again.

Yoshida gathered around her now young, talented samurai, founded a school "Shōrin-juku", planned to build a navy based on the western model. And he thought of evaluating employees less on their status at birth than on their skills. These ideas sparked opposition from radically anti-Western circles. Yoshida was finally murdered in 1862 by supporters of the local group "Tosa Kinnōtō" (土 佐 勤王 党), an extreme advocate of the Sonnō jōi direction. Their leader Takechi Zuizan (武 市 瑞 山) was sentenced to seppuku in 1865 .

Remarks

1. ↑ Juku (塾) stands for "training center" and Shōrin (少林), Chinese "Shaolin", refers to the temple where Bodhidharma experienced his enlightenment and which has become known through his training in Kung Fu .

literature

• S. Noma (Ed.): Yoshida Tōyō . In: Japan. An Illustrated Encyclopedia. Kodansha, 1993, ISBN 4-06-205938-X , p. 1758.

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . So Yoshida is the family name, Tōyō the first name.