Matsuura Takeshirō


Matsuura Takeshirō was a Japanese explorer, cartographer, writer, painter, priest, and antiquarian. During the late Edo period and Bakumatsu he journeyed six times to Ezo, including to Sakhalin and the Kuriles. In the early Meiji period he was an official in the Hokkaidō Development Commission. Instrumental in the naming of the island and many of its places, he is sometimes referred to as the "godparent of Hokkaidō".

Name

The fourth child of Matsuura Tokiharu, this is reflected in the shirō or "son and fourth child" component of his given name. Born at the Hour of the Tiger in the Year of the Tiger, the Take element of his name comes form the Japanese for bamboo, with which the tiger is closely associated. Later he switched the character for bamboo with that for valiant or brave. In adulthood he took the official name of Hiroshi, his imina, his azana being Shichō. When he entered the Buddhist priesthood in Nagasaki at the age of twenty-one he assumed the Dharma name Bunkei. He is also known to have used the art name Hokkai Dōjin from 1859; this might be parsed as "man of Hokkaidō", "man well-versed in north sea ways", or "recluse of the northern seas".

Life

Matsuura Takeshirō was born on the sixth day of the second month of Bunka 15 in the village of Sugawa, later Onoe, now Matsusaka, in what was then Ise Province, now Mie Prefecture. The samurai family is said to have had ancestral connections with the Matsuura clan of Hirado Domain in Hizen Province, northern Kyūshū. Takeshirō's father Tokiharu was a devotee of the tea ceremony and haikai and had studied under fellow Matsusaka scion Kokugaku scholar Motoori Norinaga. As his older brother was destined to take over as head of the family, Takeshirō knew from a young age he would have to venture forth in the world. Billed as his birthplace, his boyhood home in Matsusaka lies on the Ise Kaidō, the road that was once thronged with pilgrims to Ise Jingū, the 1830 pilgrimage alone seeing some five million visit the Grand Shrine.
The young Takeshirō began calligraphy lessons at the local Sōtō Zen temple of Shinkaku-ji at the age of seven. As a boy he showed signs of his later energy, playing on the temple roof, and enjoyed reading illustrated books of meisho or famous places. He also showed early literary promise himself, composing aged eleven a haiku on the subject of returning wild geese that met with the approbation of his father, and he began to manifest his later antiquarian leanings, copying pictures of temple bells from old books. When he was twelve, the chanting of Raiō Oshō, the priest who his calligraphy teacher, to succour a girl spirit obsessed by a fox, left a great impression on his young mind; the expelled fox was subsequently enshrined as Seishun Inari Ōkami, and he would later wrote of this episode in his autobiography. Early in life he had ideas of becoming a Buddhist priest himself, but his parents discouraged the notion. Aged thirteen, he was sent to the school run by Confucian scholar Hiramatsu Rakusai, where he studied Chinese and had the opportunity to meet visiting scholars from all over the country, including Yanagawa Seigan; he continued his studies there until he was sixteen.
In Tenpō 4 he abruptly set out from home, seemingly spurred on not only by wanderlust but also financial indiscretion, having been obliged secretly to sell some family heirlooms to settle debts run up buying books and antique curios. A letter written shortly after his departure notes his intentions to travel first to Edo, then Kyōto, before heading to Nagasaki, whence he would sail for Morokoshi, and perhaps even onwards to Tenjiku. Though he did not make it as far as China and India, his travels did take him along the Tōkaidō to Edo, where he stayed with Yamaguchi Gusho, learning from him the art of seal carving that is understood to have supported him on his travels, before heading along the Nakasendō to Zenkō-ji; he also climbed nearby Mount Togakushi, in what is now Myōkō-Togakushi Renzan National Park. The following year, yatate and notebooks to hand, he travelled from Kinki to Chūgoku and Shikoku and back; the next, through the Kinki, Hokuriku, Kōshin'etsu, Tōhoku, Kantō, Chūbu, and Kinki regions to Shikoku again; in 1836 he followed the Shikoku 88 temple pilgrimage route, then traversed the Kinki, San'in, and San'yō regions ; the next year took him from San'yō around Kyūshū, due to travel restrictions entering Satsuma disguised as a Buddhist monk. In 1838, at the age of 21, he was taken seriously ill in Nagasaki during an epidemic. His father passed away that year, his sister and a brother having died several years previously. While in Nagasaki, encouraged by the Zen monk who nursed him back to health, he entered the Buddhist priesthood, at Zenrin-ji, going on to serve as priest at Senkō-ji in Hirado for the next three years. In 1842 he attempted to cross from Tsushima to Chōsen, but due to sakoku or the "closed country" policy, was unable to do so. His mother died at around this time. It was while in area of Nagasaki at the age of 26 that Matsuura heard from a village headman tales of Ezo and Karafuto, and also about the increasing Russian interest in the region and the approach of Russian ships. In 1844, for the first time in nine years, he returned home, paying his respects at the graves of his parents and visiting Ise Jingū, before setting out for the north.
, and the Kuriles by Matsuura Takeshirō, issued in woodblock format in 1869 by the Hokkaidō Development Commission
Having reached as far as what is now Ajigasawa at the northern end of Honshū, he was unable to cross over to Ezo due to strict restrictions on travel imposed by the Matsumae Domain, turning back instead to Rikuzen Province. In 1845, at the age of 28, for the first time he crossed the Tsugaru Straits, to Esashi, which he left disguised as a merchant, travelling the length of the island for the next seventh months: he walked, with local Ainu as his guides, along the southern Pacific coast from Hakodate to the tip of the Shiretoko Peninsula, where he erected a marker inscribed "Ise Province, Ichishi District, Mie, before making his way back again to Hakodate, and thence to Edo. The following year, attaching himself as manservant Unpei to Nishikawa Shunan, he walked from Esashi along the Sea of Japan coast to Sōya, crossing from there to Karafuto, where they traversed the island and explored the east and west coasts of the southern end of what is now Sakhalin. Crossing back over the Sōya Strait, parting company, he walked the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk to the Shiretoko Peninsula before returning to Sōya by boat, then overland via Ishikari, Chitose, and Yūfutsu back to Esashi, and thence again to Honshū; while in Esashi he met Confucian scholar Rai Mikisaburō, the two competing each to compose a hundred poems and carve a hundred seals in one day. Three years later, in 1849, on his third Ezo expedition, he sailed from Hakodate to Kunashiri and Etorofu. He had now covered the whole of the north. In the words of Frederick Starr, "these journeys were epoch-making", with results of geographic, literary, and political significance. Again, "cartography for those regions practically dates from Matsuura". For this, equipped only with a pocket compass, he relied on his own pacing combined with observation from high points. At the same time, as well as active study of the Ainu language, he was becoming increasingly alive to the plight of the Ainu at the hands of unscrupulous traders and agents of the Matsumae Domain.
He did not return to Ezo until 1856, some seven years later. In the interim, he published multi-volume "diaries" of his first three visits, and interacted with many leading figures of this turbulent period. His house began to be frequented by the shishi or "men of high purpose" and he was in contact with sonnō jōi thinkers Aizawa Seishisai and Fujita Tōko, as well as Ikeuchi Daigaku, Rai Mikisaburō, Umeda Unpin, and Yanagawa Seigan. 1853 saw the arrival of Perry's "Black Ships" in Edo Bay; when they returned the following year, at the instigation of the Uwajima Domain, Matsuura Takeshirō followed their progress, giving rise to his Shimoda Diaries. He was also in touch with Yoshida Shōin who, in an 1853 letter of introduction to an Ōsaka gunsmith, wrote critically of the Bakufu's response to Perry's arrival at Uraga and Putyatin's at Nagasaki, while recommending Matsuura Takeshirō as one who had left his mark all over the country, had intimate knowledge of Ezo, and had the question of coastal defence at his heart. In his autobiography, Matsuura Takeshirō writes of Yoshida Shōin's stay over the New Year of 1853/4, when they stayed up till dawn discussing this topic. After the 1854 Japan–US Treaty of Peace and Amity, 1855 brought the Treaty of Commerce and Navigation between Japan and Russia; exercised by the need for greater oversight and security on the northern borders, that year also the bakufu assume direct control of Ezo, excepting the immediate environs of Matsumae Castle.
Under new shōgun Tokugawa Iesada, and with the situation in Ezo in light of Russian activity increasingly a priority, the significance of his endeavours began to receive recognition from the top: in 1855 he was given ten ryō of gold by the bakufu, twice as much arriving in the next few days, from Tokugawa Nariaki, daimyō of Mito Domain, and Date Yoshikuni, daimyō of Sendai Domain. He received instructed to travel to Ezo again, this time as an employee of the bakufu, for further work on its geography, to investigate its mountains and rivers, and the potential for new roads. Over the next three years, three visits would ensue—indeed, one theory sees those earlier not as private initiatives, but operations in the pay of the bakufu, connecting this to the obstacles placed in his way by the Matsumae Domain. Joining the expedition headed by Mukōyama Gendayū, he completed a circuit of the island, travelling clockwise from Hakodate, also crossing the Sōya Strait to the northern regions of Ezo, as far as what is now Poronaysk, on Sakhalin. Mukōyama died along the way, Matsuura himself so ill that he composed a death poem. The following year, abandoning plans for further investigation of Sakhalin, he followed the courses of the Ishikari and Teshio Rivers, from their mouths to their upstream regions. His final visit, in 1858, included investigation of the interior of the centre and the east of the island, around Akan. His surveys covered both physical and human geography, and suggestions for the development of the land and the advancement of its inhabitants. Records of these three years run to 117 volumes, while he also aimed at a wider audience through works such as Ezo Manga and a series of travelogues full of detail on the local mountains and rivers, flaura and fauna, and the customs, legends, and material culture of the Ainu he encountered along the way. Sympathetic to their plight, his 1858 Account of the People of Ezo in Recent Times, which includes their sufferings at the hands of traders and officials of the Matsumae Domain, was refused for publication by the Hakodate bugyō.
and of the Ainu to a wider readership
As Bakumatsu drew to its close, as an authority on the north, Matsuura Takeshirō was visited by the likes of Ōkubo Toshimichi and Saigō Takamori, leading figures in the Meiji Restoration. Ōkubo advocated a role for him in the new government, with responsibilities relating to the development of Ezo, and, after conducting a survey of the Tōkaidō, he was assigned a position in the administration of the short-lived Hakodate Prefecture and elevated to the Junior Fifth Court Rank, Lower Grade. Shortly after he became Adjutant to the Governor of Tōkyō Prefecture; he was involved in dividing the prefecture into districts; and he was a herald during the transfer of the capital from Kyōto. With the establishment of the Hokkaidō Development Commission in 1869, he was appointed a Developmemt Commissioner. While in post, he focused on official nomenclature, for the island's districts and what are now its subprefectures, as well as finding a replacement for "Ezo" itself. Putting forward six alternatives, the government chose Hokkaidō, substituting the character for sea for the two characters for kai, which he had drawn from Legends of Atsuta Shrine, the repository of the sword Kusanagi no Tsurugi, one of the Three Sacred Treasures, having first heard of kai as an old Ainu endonym for the Ainu people from an elder encountered during his journey up the Teshio River in 1857; thus was "Hokkaidō" born. Indeed, since he went by the art name Hokkai Dōjin, it could even be said his alias became the island's name, and Matsuura Takeshirō is sometimes referred to for these reasons as "the Godparent of Hokkaidō". He also had his Fifth Court Rank raised and was given a hundred ryō of gold. In 1870, however, he retired from his post, unhappy with the direction taken and frustrated in his attempts to approve the lot of the Ainu, the island's traders seemingly having worked to isolate him within the Commission while sending bribes to its head Higashikuze Michitomi, who refused to countenance his views. He also surrendered his court rank, becoming a shizoku of Tōkyō Prefecture, and receiving a government pension equivalent to the income of fifteen men.
Now 53, his house in Tōkyō was visited by artists, poets, and statesmen. He continued to travel, collecting old coins, magatama, unusually shaped rocks, and the like, which he catalogued and exhibited. He also engaged in the appraisal of artworks and dealing. He followed up his lifelong interest in Sugawara no Michizane, as man, Tenjin, as kami, dedicating a serious of oversize bronze mirrors, in diameter and weighing, to Tenmangū shrines founded in his honour, first Kitano Tenmangū, later Ōsaka Tenmangū and Dazaifu Tenmangū, as well as at Ueno Tōshō-gū and Kimpusen-ji, and also smaller mirrors at twenty further shrines to Tenjin. In 1881, he commissioned a painting from Kawanabe Kyōsai entitled Hokkai Dōjin Taking a Nap Under the Trees, a reworking of the traditional nirvāṇa painting that, completed five years later, shows a snoozing Matsuura Takeshirō surrounded by objects from his collection, in place of the usual mourners. At the end of his seventh decade, he climbed Mount Ōdaigahara three times, maintaining the mountain trails and rest huts, as well as Mount Fuji. In Meiji 21, struck down by meningitis, and elevated once more to Fifth Court Rank, he died of a cerebral haemorrhage. His funeral expenses covered by the Emperor, he was initially laid to rest in Asakusa, his remains subsequently transferred and divided, in accordance with his last will and testament, between the Somei Cemetery in Tōkyō and his beloved Mount Ōdaigahara.

One-Mat Room

Around two years before his death, Matsuura Takeshirō appended to his house in Kanda a one-mat room, observing that, while various one-and-a-half-mat huts had been built, this would be the first measuring only one mat. Helped by being in height, he proceeded to live in this room for the remainder of his life. Named One-Mat Room or Grass Abode, built into and adorning it were nearly a hundred old members from temples, shrines, and historic buildings across the country, from Miyagi to Miyazaki, sent to him by his friends, the name plaque being burnt wood from the west gate of Shitennō-ji, window surrounds coming from Kōfuku-ji and Ishiyama-dera, a beam that was formerly a pillar at Kennin-ji, and other such from Byōdō-in, Daian-ji, Hōryū-ji, Kōdai-ji, Mii-dera, Tōfuku-ji, Ise Jingū, Izumo Taisha, Kasuga Taisha, Itsukushima Jina, Tsurugaoka Hachimangū, Kitano Tenmangū, Hiei-zan, Togetsu Bridge, Kumamoto Castle, even the torii from Emperor Go-Daigo's mausoleum in Yoshino. Some eighty-nine items are catalogued with illustrations and detail as to their provenance in his Solicitation for Wooden Fragments. His wishes that the room be cremated with him were disregarded; changing hands several times since his death, it is now preserved at the Taizansō villa in the grounds of International Christian University in Tōkyō.

Select Writings

In 2018 a series of sixty-nine stelai inscribed wih Matsuura Takeshirō's poems, markers denoting places he stayed, and other inscriptions and monuments in his honour was jointly designated Hokkaidō Heritage, an initiative aimed at valorization of the island's natural and cultural heritage, as Traces of Matsuura Takeshirō's Exploration of Ezo. These include:

Eternal links