Elementary Education in the Sakura Domain School

Focusing on Its Tohjuku and Sehjuku School

Abstract

The hanko, or Japan’s feudal domain schools, was built to educate children of feudal retainers or warriors, and would play a vital role for education in the country’s early modern age, together along with private schools and terakoya or temple schools. Following the Meiji Restoration, modernization and the development of education occurred during the modern age. Given the challenges of educational reform today, it would thus be meaningful to review the education in the early modern age, which should be honored as the prime point of modern Japanese education. This study examines the hanko of the Sakura Domain in Shimousa Province. The hanko was established by Masaari Hotta in 1792 (Kansei Era 4), and Masayoshi Hotta expanded the hanko as part of the feudal domain’s political reforms and renewed it under the name seitoku shoin. The education was based on neo-Confucianism and the military arts, Western subjects, such as rangaku, or Dutch studies, and eigaku, or the study of the English language as a means to acquire Western knowledge, were incorporated in the program. While the hanko’s programs were meant for the children of feudal retainers or warriors from the ages of 15 to 24, there have only been a few descriptions regarding its education for younger age groups with no depth analyses introduced.

Hence, this paper explores student-guidance books from two schools, Tohjuku (or East) and Sehjuku (or West), which were educational institutions where children of the feudal retainers and warriors from ages 8 to 14 studied. This study looks into the Sakura Domain as an example, by investigating its hanko’s elementary education.