A was a daimyo

Daimyo

is a generic term referring to the powerful territorial lords in pre-modern Japan who ruled most of the country from their vast, hereditary land holdings...

 who was considered an outsider by the rulers of Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

. The term came into use in the Kamakura period

Kamakura period

The is a period of Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura Shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura by the first shogun Minamoto no Yoritomo....

 and continued until the end of the Edo period

Edo period

The , or , is a division of Japanese history which was ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family, running from 1603 to 1868. The political entity of this period was the Tokugawa shogunate....

.

Edo period

The daimyo who submitted to the Tokugawa shogunate

Tokugawa shogunate

The Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the and the , was a feudal regime of Japan established by Tokugawa Ieyasu and ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family. This period is known as the Edo period and gets its name from the capital city, Edo, which is now called Tokyo, after the name was...

 after the Battle of Sekigahara

Battle of Sekigahara

The , popularly known as the , was a decisive battle on October 21, 1600 which cleared the path to the Shogunate for Tokugawa Ieyasu...

, that is who became Tokugawa vassals only after the battle, were classified as tozama. They included both daimyo who fought with the Tokugawa and those who fought against them. Many of the largest fiefs

Han (Japan)

The or domain was the name of the estate belonging to a warrior in Japan after the 17th century. The fiefs of the daimyos of the samurai class of Japan during the Edo period were called han.-Edo period:...

 were ruled by tozama. The biggest was the Maeda clan

Maeda clan

The was a branch of the Sugawara clan who descended from Sugawara no Kiyotomo and Sugawara no Michizane in the eighth and ninth centuries. It was one of the most powerful samurai families in Japan and they were second only to the Tokugawa clan in rice production and fief size...

 of Kaga

Kaga Domain

The was a powerful feudal domain in Kaga, Noto and Etchū Provinces of Japan during the Edo period. The domain was founded by Maeda Toshiie and headed by the Maeda clan. Its income rating, over 1,000,000 koku, was the highest in the nation after the Tokugawa shogunate itself...

  with a value of 1,000,000 koku

Koku

The is a Japanese unit of volume, equal to ten cubic shaku. In this definition, 3.5937 koku equal one cubic metre, i.e. 1 koku is approximately 278.3 litres. The koku was originally defined as a quantity of rice, historically defined as enough rice to feed one person for one year...

. Others included the Shimazu family

Shimazu family

The were the daimyō of the Satsuma han, which spread over Satsuma, Ōsumi and Hyūga provinces in Japan.The Shimazu were identified as one of the tozama or outsider daimyō clans in contrast with the fudai or insider clans which were hereditary vassals or allies of the Tokugawa clan,The Shimazu were...

 of Satsuma, the Mori

Mori clan

The Mōri clan was a family of daimyō, descended from Ōe no Hiromoto and established themselves in Aki Province. Their name was derived from a shōen in Mōri, Aikō District, Sagami Province. The generation of Hiromoto began to name themselves Mōri.After the Jōkyū War, Mōri was appointed to the jitō...

, the Date

Date family

The ' was a lineage of daimyo who controlled northern Japan in the late 16th century and into the Edo period. Their most famous member was Date Masamune, who established the family's power by avenging his father's death and through support of Tokugawa Ieyasu.-History:The Date family was founded in...

, Hachisuka

Hachisuka clan

The ' are descendants of Emperor Seiwa and are a branch of the Ashikaga clan and the Shiba clan .Ashikaga Ieuji , son of Ashikaga Yasuuji was the first who adopted the name of Shiba...

, and the Uesugi

Uesugi clan

The was a Japanese samurai clan, descended from the Fujiwara clan and particularly notable for their power in the Muromachi and Sengoku periods ....

. Many, but not all, of these families, had been living in roughly the same regions for centuries before the Tokugawa shogunate.

Tokugawa Ieyasu had treated the great tozama vassal

Vassal

A vassal or feudatory is a person who has entered into a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. The obligations often included military support and mutual protection, in exchange for certain privileges, usually including the grant of land held...

s amicably but later, between 1623 and 1626, Tokugawa Iemitsu

Tokugawa Iemitsu

Tokugawa Iemitsu was the third shogun of the Tokugawa dynasty. He was the eldest son of Tokugawa Hidetada, and the grandson of Tokugawa Ieyasu. Iemitsu ruled from 1623 to 1651.-Early life :...

 was less tolerant of them. Particularly in western Japan, the tozama daimyo heavily profited from foreign trade in the mid 17th century. Their growing success was a threat to the shogunate, which responded by preventing the ports of western Japan and Kyūshū

Kyushu

is the third largest island of Japan and most southwesterly of its four main islands. Its alternate ancient names include , , and . The historical regional name is referred to Kyushu and its surrounding islands....

 from trading.

To keep the tozama in check, the shogunate stationed fudai

Fudai

was a class of daimyo who were hereditary vassals of the Tokugawa in Edo period Japan. It was primarily the fudai who filled the ranks of the Tokugawa administration.-Origins:...

daimyo in strategic locations, including along major roads and near important cities. For much of the Edo period, the shogunate ordinarily did not appoint tozama to high positions within the government. These went instead to the fudai daimyo. However, this began to change in the Bakumatsu era; one tozama daimyo (Matsumae Takahiro

Matsumae Takahiro

was a Japanese daimyo of the Edo period, who ruled the Matsumae Domain. Though he was a tozama daimyo, he served in the Tokugawa Shogunate as a rōjū. His court title was Izu no kami.-Youth:...

) even became a rōjū

Roju

The ', usually translated as Elder, was one of the highest-ranking government posts in Tokugawa Japan. The term refers either to individual Elders, or to the Council as a whole; under the first two shoguns, there were only two Rōjū...

.

Tozama daimyo from Satsuma

Satsuma han

The Satsuma domain was one of the most powerful feudal domains in Tokugawa Japan, and played a major role in the Meiji Restoration and in the government of the Meiji period which followed...

 and Choshu

Choshu Han

The was a feudal domain of Japan during the Edo period occupying the whole of modern day Yamaguchi Prefecture. It was coterminous with Nagato Province: in fact, Chōshū was simply shorthand for the province. The domain played a major role in the Late Tokugawa shogunate...

 (Shimazu and Mori clans respectively) were responsible for the fall of the Tokugawa Shogunate during the Bakumatsu era. Rallying other tozama to their cause, they fought against the shogunate, Aizu, and the Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei

Ouetsu Reppan Domei

-External links:**...

 during the Boshin War

Boshin War

The was a civil war in Japan, fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and those seeking to return political power to the imperial court....

 of 1868–69. Many people from Satsuma and Choshu dominated politics in the ensuing decades, and well into the 20th century, as part of the Meiji oligarchy

Meiji oligarchy

The Meiji oligarchy was the name used to describe the new ruling class of Meiji period Japan. In Japanese, the Meiji oligarchy is called the ....

.