1. It is still somewhat easy to give the impression that Japan was a “closed country,” since economic historians have overwhelmingly dealt with Japan’s internal development. Certainly scholars such as Ronald Toby, Tashiro Kazui, Arano Yasunori, and many others have dealt with Japan’s foreign relations during this period, but the balance of scholarship seems to concentrate on what Hayami Akira calls the “industrious revolution,” or at least the internal economic activity that was a precursor to Meiji Japan’s “economic miracle.” See, for example, Chie Nakane and Shinzaburo Oishi, Tokugawa Japan: The Social and Economic Antecedents of Modern Japan, trans. Conrad Totman (Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1991).

2. Bakufu means literally “tent government” and is a reference to a time when the rank of shogun meant simply “barbarian subduing Generalissimo.” As “shogun” evolved into a permanent postition more or less akin to that of a military dictator, “bakufu” came to denote his government, located in this case in the city of Edo.

3. Hendrick Brouwer, Governor-General at Batavia, wrote in 1636 that with the Japanese prohibition against travel abroad, the trade of all of Southeast Asia had fallen into Dutch hands. Needless to say, Dutch officials greeted the shogunal edict with a great deal of enthusiasm. See W. Ph. Coolhaas, ed., Generale Missiven van Governeurs-Generaal en Raden aan Heren XVII der Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie: Deel I, 1610–1638 (‘s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1960), 522: January 4, 1636.

4. Many of these conversations took place in the form of “interviews” with various shogunal councilors in Edo. One such example is recorded in the diary of Nicholas Couckebacker in early April 1636. See Shiryo Hensan-jo, Nihon Kankei Kaigai Shiryo. Dagregisters Gehouden bij de Opperhoofden van de Nederlandshe Factorij in Japan, Vol. I (Tokyo: Tokyo Daigaku Shiryo Hensan-jo, 1974), 217. Hereafter NKKS.

5. The most obvious example of this concerns the Sō house on Tsushima. In order to make it seem that the shogun was placing himself in a position that was akin to that of a diplomatic equal with the king of Korea, the daimyo of Tsushima forged the shogun’s signature in a letter. The deception did not stop there, however; to keep from being caught, all signatures on subsequent letters had to be forged as well.