Mapping Island Life: the Isolation of the Tokugawa Bakufu

Map of Edo from the mid-19th century.

Mapping Island Life: the Isolation of the Tokugawa Bakufu

This map of Edo[1] illustrates not only the physical, but also the sociopolitical isolation of the Shogunate at the approximate time of Japan’s opening to the West. More importantly, the map also provides a sense of the priorities of the Shogunate at this time, and sheds light into a mindset that would lead to the government’s eventual disintegration leading up to the Meiji Restoration.

Maps have been a political resource and instrument of power for members of the ruling elite throughout history. In J. B. Harley’s “Maps, knowledge, and power”, Harley describes maps as “a means of surveillance” involving “‘the collation of information relevant to state control of its subject population’ and ‘the direct supervision of that conduct’”[2]. Maps, then, are both a way for governments to collect information pertinent to their ability to rule, and a means to execute that rule. To this end, maps can be designed in a variety of ways that communicate to readers – usually members of government or the ruling elite² – specific types of information. For example, the “subliminal geometry” of maps – “their graphic design in relation to the location on which they are centered or to the projection which determines their transformational relationship to the earth” – can be used to communicate subconscious knowledge². Centering a map on a specific element, for example, can emphasize its importance. Additionally, the cartographic labeling of a map can impart or deprive geographic features of importance – Harley describes the “silence on maps”, or areas of omission, as a means of expressing political opinion of the rulers over the ruled². How a map is labeled, in addition to how it is oriented, affords a variety of angles with which to analyze the culture that created it.

The geography, subliminal geometry, and cartographic labeling of the map of Edo illustrates the physical isolation of the Shoguate and potentially sheds light on the means by which its rule progressed into inefficacy and self-entanglement. The most prominent figure on the map is the large Tokugawa crest, painted in yellow, black, and red at the center of the page, which represents the location of the headquarters of the Tokugawa shogunate¹. Here, the use of the aforementioned subliminal geometry indicates that the creator of the map – likely a member of the Tokugawa government – is emphasizing the importance of the Tokugawa headquarters as the physical center of Edo. A further enlightening feature of this location is that it is surrounded by a variety of small rivers¹ – the Tokugawa government, therefore, sits on an island. While a variety of other blocks appear to be contiguous with the island, these are nearly all labeled with the crests of other prominent daimyo of the various domains of pre-modern Japan¹. The Tokugawa government thus is headquartered in a location where they need not interact with, or even brush shoulders with the general populace – their rule, then extends over people who they rarely see, and likely barely understand. A deeper contrast can be seen in the nature of the labeling of the rest of the map – peasant districts seem to be either labeled with a number, and (丁) (literally, “district”), or (田), or “plain,” meaning farmland¹. Whereas the daimyo are given household-level symbolic representation in a colored crest, entire swaths of peasant population are minimized into nondescript, thin dark characters. This omission of peasant identity reflects the mindset of the ruling class – that the masses are unimportant, and that the daimyo are the only ones whose voices and names should be recorded. It is this type of entrenchment in its own affairs and sense of self-importance that ultimately leads to the downfall of the shogunate.