ABSTRACT
After the establishment of official diplomatic contacts in 1861, the relations between Japan and Germany developed in a friendly way over most of the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Germany provided valuable models for Meiji Japan’s modernization. In a sense, particularly the 1880s can be described as a process of Germanization. Taking the Prussian constitution as a blueprint, the Meiji Constitution was promulgated in 1889. German influence was also notable in other fields such as education, medicine, military or the new Imperial court system. It was at the time of the Sino-Japanese War 1894-5, however, when the German Kaiser Wilhelm II (1859-1941; r. 1888-1918), ventilated the idea of the menace of a unified yellow race that the bilateral relations began to turn sour. This idea soon came to be known as the ‘Yellow Peril’.
