Aizu Domain

Many of you requested an article on Aizu a few months ago (follow me on Instagram to ask questions!), and although I have been wanting to write about it for a very long time, I struggled to find where and how to start. Aizu is a big topic! I wanted to introduce the domain as the core of Tokugawa loyalism during the Bakumatsu period, but this would have offered minimal context. So, I decided to start at the very beginning and, once again, make a series of posts.

Aizu is located north of Tokyo in the Tohoku Region, and its name is composed of two kanji 会 (meet) and 津 (haven). It was part of the large Mutsu province under the Ritsuryō system (see Octobre 13, 2022 post for information). I got curious as to why this landlocked region was named as such, and the only explanation is found in the Kojiki (712 AD Chronicle of Myths). In the 3rd century BC, the first powerful clansmen to enter the Aizu region were Emperor Kōgen's son, Ōhiko no Mikoto, and his son, Takenunakawawake no Mikoto, and it is said that the place was named "Aizu" (相津) after the two met (会).
Forward a few hundred years and multiple lords from different clans (second picture - see details in the comments), the domain was eventually administered by members of a branch of the Tokugawa - the Matsudaira. Historically, it would be more accurate to say that the Tokugawa was a branch of the Matsudaira, as Tokugawa Ieyasu was born Matsudaira Takechiyo and was the one to establish the Tokugawa clan in the late 1560s.

List of famous lords who ruled Aizu domain from top right to bottom left: Ashina Naomori (1323–1391), Date Masamune (1567-1636), Gamō Ujisato (1556-1595), Uesugi Kagekatsu (1556-1623), Gamo Hideyuki (1583-1612), Kato Yoshiaki (1563-1631), Hoshina Masayuki (1611-1673) and finally, the Matsudaira clan (Tokugawa branch) -and yes I had to purchase this tenugui.

The domain of Aizu was known for its military skills and interestingly, it had a military code that was not centred around personal military discipline, but rather on human rights:

敵地に入って、婦女を犯し、老幼を害し、墳墓を荒らし、民家を焼き、猥りに畜類を殺し、米金を掠取り、故なく林木を伐り、作毛を刈取べからざる事。

"In enemy territory, it is forbidden to rape women, harm the elderly and children, desecrate graves, torch the homes of commoners, slaughter livestock needlessly, pillage money and rice, cut trees without reason, and steal crops in the field."

While this is certainly not the first code of its kind in the world, this was rather unique for the late 1700s (the Geneva Convention was written in 1864). 

We will (unfortunately) have to come back to this code in later events. 

This is it for this very brief introduction, next post on Aizu in the 1850s coming soon!