Takato Castle - Domain School

Takatô-hankō Shintokukan (Takatô, Ina, Nagano)　　高遠藩校進徳館　［長野県伊那市高遠町］ Shintokukan, the hankō (samurai school) of the Takatô Domain, was established in 1860 by the last lord of Takatô-han, Naitō Yarinao. 'Shintokukan' means something like 'School of Advancing Virtue'. The school building is located wi

Takato Castle - Domain School

高遠藩校進徳館

Takatô-hankō Shintokukan (Takatô, Ina, Nagano)　　高遠藩校進徳館　［長野県伊那市高遠町］

Shintokukan, the hankō (samurai school) of the Takatô Domain, was established in 1860 by the last lord of Takatô-han, Naitō Yarinao. 'Shintokukan' means something like 'School of Advancing Virtue'. The school building is located within the sannomaru (third bailey) of Takatô Castle. The wooden statues are representations of Confucian sages whom the samurai venerated like gods. Confucius is in the middle and Mencius is on the far left. Neo-Confucianism was the guiding philosophy of the samurai of the Edo period. Confucian temples were also often built at larger domain schools.

Buddhist institutions, including Zen, were mainly used as a tool by the Shogunate to tax and monitor the peasantry. Whilst samurai were educated at hankō like this one, which were usually located within or next to castles, commoners were educated mostly at downtown or village temples, or sometimes at private schools or by private tutors if they could afford it (for example, the children of wealthy merchants may be educated at dedicated institutions or occasionally even share educational spaces with samurai; some lords established schools especially for common people but these were rare).

Confucianism in any institutional form, along with many folk faiths, such as Shugendō, was eventually ousted along with the old regime, and Japan’s new leaders favoured Nativism and their project of State Shintō. During the Meiji Revolution, Confucianism ceased to be a religious force and Buddhism was likewise nearly wiped out – although it later recovered. Descendants of samurai, if they continued to train in martial ways, adopted Nationalism, State Shintō and Emperor Reverence as their new ethico-religious mandate (and, by the way, Zen’s modern ties to the martial arts originated during the demilitarisation of Japan’s martial traditions after the Pacific War). Nativism and Emperor Reverence as a powerful political and spiritual force began in large part at the Mito-hankō (Mito Domain School), the school of thought of which is referred to as Mitogaku (the Mito School).

Shintokukan’s curriculum was less ambitious but nonetheless educated future bushi in the essentials: Japanese studies, Chinese studies (Sun Tzu and other classics), literature, writing, military studies (heigaku), and practical skills such as archery, horse-riding, gunnery, kenjutsu, jūjutsu and the use of pole arms. Later, western studies were also introduced. After Matsushiro’s Bunbugakkō, Shintokukan is probably the best preserved hankō in Shinano (Nagano), but even so it used to be more extensive.

Gallery by ART.