ABSTRACT
From the late twelfth century to the middle of the nineteenth century, the samurai (swordsmen) class ruled Japan. The ¼rst period of samurai rule, up to the early seventeenth century, was an age of frequent wars among samurai lords over in½uence and territories. After the decisive Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 and the extinction of the rival Toyotomi Family in 1615, Tokugawa Ieyasu emerged as the ¼nal winner unifying and bringing peace to the country. Ieyasu and his posterity in the Tokugawa Family, 15 in all, ruled the country as shogun (supreme military leader) in the following twoand-half centuries. Although the emperor, residing in Kyoto, nominally gave the authority to rule to the head of the Tokugawa Family, who resided in Edo (now Tokyo), real power was exercised by the latter and not the former. The central military government in Edo was called Bakufu and the period of Tokugawa shogunate, from 1603 to 1867, was called the Edo period.
