Ashigaru: light foot soldier, lowest rank in the samurai class.
Boshin War: (1868–1869) a series of civil war battles around the time of the collapse of the Tokugawa shogunate.
Bushidō: the moral code of the samurai, stressing loyalty, mastery of the martial arts, and death with honor.
Chōshū: present-day Yamaguchi Prefecture; one of the two major domains, together with Satsuma, that led the overthrow of the Tokugawa shogunate (1603–1868).
Genrō: elder statesmen who were “founding fathers” of the modern state of Japan and the chief advisors to the emperor.
Geta: high wooden clogs with a V-shaped cloth thong that passes between the first and second toes.
Go: board game in which two players, Black and White, alternately place black and white stones on a large ruled board to compete for surrounding territory.
Haikai: a form of linked verse from which haiku evolved.
Hakama: formal divided overskirt, worn over a kimono, tied at the waist, and falling almost to the ankles.
Haori: a traditional formal jacket worn over a kimono, with short cord fasteners tied at chest level.
Hatamoto: direct vassals of the Tokugawa shogunate.
Jōruri: a form of narrative chanting accompanied by the three-stringed samisen, commonly associated with the puppet theater.
Kokinshū: classical imperial anthology of waka poetry compiled ca. 905.
Koku: a unit of rice equivalent to about 180 liters (5 bushels); in Tokugawa Japan, land value for taxation purposes was expressed in koku of rice; one koku was generally viewed as enough to feed one person for a year.
Kumi: groups of samurai that made up the organizational structure of the feudal domains.
Man’yōshū: Japan’s earliest extant collection of poetry, compiled in the eighth century.
Meiji Restoration: overthrow of the Tokugawa shogunate and restoration of the emperor’s direct rule of Japan in 1868.
Minamoto no Yoshitsune: a general (1159–1189) of the Minamoto clan, regarded as one of the most famous samurai fighters in the history of Japan and a tragic hero who was forced to commit suicide by his brother Yoritomo, founder of the Kamakura shogunate.
Oda Nobunaga: warlord (1534–1582) who began Japan’s reunification after the hundred years of civil war known as the era of Warring States.
Okachi: low-status samurai (but higher than the ashigaru); light foot soldiers.
Rin: unit of Japanese currency equal to 1/1000 yen (1/10 sen), used from the beginning of the Meiji era until 1953.
Rōnin: masterless samurai.
Ryō: a unit of currency used during the Tokugawa period; the standard gold coin was equivalent to one ryō.
Satsuma Rebellion: 1877, the last major armed uprising against the new central government, started by disgruntled former Satsuma samurai with Saigō Takamori as their leader.
Satsuma: present-day Kagoshima Prefecture; one of the two major domains, together with Chōshū, that led the overthrow of the Tokugawa shogunate (1603–1868).
Sen (money): unit of Japanese currency equal to 1/100 yen, used from the beginning of the Meiji era until 1953.
Seppuku: ritual suicide by disembowelment, originally reserved for samurai warriors only.
Shinkokinshū: classical imperial anthology of waka poetry compiled ca. 1205.
Shinsengumi: the group of elite swordsmen who served as a special police force in the late Tokugawa period.
Shōgi: Japanese chess, in which a player wins by checkmating the opponent’s king; unlike Western chess, players can use captured pieces, and their own pieces can be promoted, sometimes several ranks higher at a time, from pawn to gold, for example.
Tanka: (see waka).
Three hundred feudal lords: this phrase refers to “all feudal lords,” for there were roughly three hundred feudal lords (daimyo) across Tokugawa Japan.
Tokiwa Society: educational support organization sponsored by the lord of the former Matsuyama domain to promote the study in Tokyo of talented young men from around Matsuyama.
Tokugawa period: rule of Japan by the Tokugawa shoguns 1603–1868; also called the Edo period, after the name of the capital Edo (now Tokyo).
Toyotomi Hideyoshi: warlord (1537–1598) of humble origin who completed a reunification of sixteenth-century Japan begun by his lord Oda Nobunaga.
Tsubo: a unit of area, roughly 3.3 square meters, corresponding to two tatami mats.
Waka (also tanka): a classical form of poetry dating to the eighth century, with thirty-one syllables in the pattern 5-7-5-7-7.