This list contains notable Europeans and Americans who visited Japan before the Meiji Restoration. The name of each individual is followed by the year of the first visit, the country of origin, and a brief explanation.
(Note: In 1639, the Japanese government promulgated the Sakoku policy, which prohibited foreigners from entering Japanese territory. The only exceptions were Dutch traders and associated workers permitted to live on Dejima Island. This policy lasted until 1854.)
Dejima or Deshima, in the 17th century also called Tsukishima, was an artificial island off Nagasaki, Japan, that served as a trading post for the Portuguese (1570–1639) and subsequently the Dutch (1641–1858). For 220 years, it was the central conduit for foreign trade and cultural exchange with Japan during the isolationist Edo period (1600–1869), and the only Japanese territory open to Westerners.
The Edo period, also known as the Tokugawa period, is the period between 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional daimyo. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was characterized by economic growth, strict social order, isolationist foreign policies, a stable population, overall peace, and popular enjoyment of arts and culture, colloquially referred to as Ōedo.
Bakumatsu were the final years of the Edo period when the Tokugawa shogunate ended. Between 1853 and 1867, under foreign diplomatic and military pressure, Japan ended its isolationist foreign policy known as sakoku and changed from a feudal Tokugawa shogunate to the modern empire of the Meiji government. The major ideological-political divide during this period was between the pro-imperial nationalists called ishin shishi and the shogunate forces, which included the elite shinsengumi swordsmen.
Tokugawa Tsunayoshi was the fifth shōgun of the Tokugawa dynasty of Japan. He was the younger brother of Tokugawa Ietsuna, as well as the son of Tokugawa Iemitsu, the grandson of Tokugawa Hidetada, and the great-grandson of Tokugawa Ieyasu.
Hirado is a city located in Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan. As of 1 June 2024, the city had an estimated population of 28,172, and a population density of 120 people per km2. The total area of the city is 235.12 km2 (90.78 sq mi)
The Black Ships were the names given to both Portuguese merchant ships and American warships arriving in Japan in the 16th and 19th centuries respectively.
Sakoku is the most common name for the isolationist foreign policy of the Japanese Tokugawa shogunate under which, during the Edo period, relations and trade between Japan and other countries were severely limited, and almost all foreign nationals were banned from entering Japan, while common Japanese people were kept from leaving the country. The policy was enacted by the shogunate government (bakufu) under Tokugawa Iemitsu through a number of edicts and policies from 1633 to 1639. The term sakoku originates from the manuscript work Sakoku-ron (鎖國論) written by Japanese astronomer and translator Shizuki Tadao in 1801. Shizuki invented the word while translating the works of the 17th-century German traveller Engelbert Kaempfer namely, his book, 'the history of Japan', posthumously released in 1727.
Rangaku, and by extension Yōgaku, is a body of knowledge developed by Japan through its contacts with the Dutch enclave of Dejima, which allowed Japan to keep abreast of Western technology and medicine in the period when the country was closed to foreigners from 1641 to 1853 because of the Tokugawa shogunate's policy of national isolation (sakoku).
Jan Joosten van Lodensteyn, known in Japanese as Yayōsu (耶楊子), was a Dutch navigator and trader.
Melchior van Santvoort was one of the first Dutchmen in Japan, was a purser on the Dutch ship De Liefde, which was stranded in Japan in 1600. Some of his shipmates were Jacob Quaeckernaeck, Jan Joosten, and William Adams. Van Santvoort remained in Japan, where he spent 39 years as a merchant in Nagasaki.
The Nagasaki Naval Training Center was a naval training institute, between 1855 when it was established by the government of the Tokugawa shogunate, until 1859, when it was transferred to Tsukiji in Edo.
Jan Hendrik Donker Curtius was the last Opperhoofd of the Dutch trading post in Japan (1852-1855), located at Dejima an artificial island in the harbor of Nagasaki. To negotiate with the Japanese government for a treaty, he received the title "Dutch Commissioner in Japan" in 1855.
Isaac Titsingh FRS was a Dutch diplomat, historian, Japanologist, and merchant. During a long career in East Asia, Titsingh was a senior official of the Dutch East India Company. He represented the European trading company in exclusive official contact with Tokugawa Japan, traveling to Edo twice for audiences with the shogun and other high bakufu officials. He was the Dutch and VOC governor general in Chinsura, Bengal.
Hendrik Godfried Duurkoop was a Dutch merchant-trader and VOC Opperhoofd in Japan. During his career with the Dutch East Indies Company, he worked on Dejima, a small artificial island in the harbor of Nagasaki, Japan.
Nagasaki bugyō (長崎奉行) were officials of the Tokugawa shogunate in Edo period Japan. Appointments to this prominent office were usually fudaidaimyōs, but this was amongst the senior administrative posts open to those who were not daimyōs. Conventional interpretations have construed these Japanese titles as "commissioner", "overseer" or "governor".
VOC chief traders in Japan were the opperhoofden of the Dutch East India Company in Japan during the Edo period, when Japan was ruled by the Tokugawa shogunate.
Jacques Specx was a Dutch merchant, who founded the trade on Japan and Korea in 1609. Jacques Specx received the support of William Adams to obtain extensive trading rights from Tokugawa Ieyasu, the shōgun emeritus, on 24 August 1609, which allowed him to establish a trading factory in Hirado on 20 September 1609. He was the interim governor in Batavia between 1629 and 1632. There his daughter Saartje Specx was involved in a scandal. Back home in Holland Specx became an art-collector.
Leopold Willem Ras (1760s–1823) was a Dutch merchant-trader and diplomat.
The Dutch East India Company missions to Edo were regular tribute missions to the court of the Tokugawa shōgun in Edo to reassure the ties between the Bakufu and the Opperhoofd. The Opperhoofd of the Dutch factory in Dejima and his attendants were escorted by the Japanese to Edo where they presented exotic and elaborate gifts to the shōgun: clocks, telescopes, medicines, artillery and rare animals were usual gifts of the tribute missions. The shōgun would correspond at the same time with gifts to the Dutch. The tribute system, as in China, served to enhance the idea of the shōgun's supremacy to his subjects.
The Hirado Dutch Trading Post was a trading base of the Dutch East India Company on the island of Hirado, Nagasaki Prefecture Japan. It was established in 1609 and lasted for 33 years. The site was designated a National Historic Site of Japan in 1922.