daimyō of the Kumamoto domain The Hosokawa of Kokura (later Kumamoto) became the "main" line of the Hosokawa clan during the Edo period.
Hosokawa Gracia, the wife of
Hosokawa Tadaoki, was one of the most famous samurai converts to Christianity; she was also the daughter of
Akechi Mitsuhide. The Hosokawa sided with
Tokugawa Ieyasu against
Ishida Mitsunari during the decisive
Sekigahara Campaign, and thus were made
fudai (inside)
daimyō under the
Tokugawa shogunate. They were given
Higo Province, with an income of 540,000
koku, as their
han (fief).
Hosokawa Tadatoshi, the third lord of Kumamoto, was the patron of the artist and
swordsman Miyamoto Musashi. File:Statue of Hosokawa Tadatoshi.jpg|Statue of
Hosokawa Tadatoshi within
Suizen-ji Jōju-en File:Hidari mitsudomoe.svg|
Mon of
Miyamoto Musashi born in
Ōhara-chō province of Mimasaka Though the Hosokawa domain was far from both the shogunate and imperial capital, on Kyūshū, they were among the wealthiest of the
daimyōs. By 1750, Higo was one of the top producers of rice, and was in fact counted as a standard by the
Osaka rice brokers. The domain suffered from serious economic decline after that, as most domains did, but the sixth lord,
Hosokawa Shigekata (1718–1785, r. 1747–1785) instituted a number of reforms which turned the situation around. He also founded a
Han school,
Jishūkan, in 1755. In later years, it produced many scholars such as
Yokoi Shōnan. In 1787, the main family line descended from Tadatoshi became extinct with the death of the 7th lord, Shigekata's son Harutoshi (1758–1787; r. 1785–1787). He was succeeded by his distant cousin Narishige, the sixth Lord of Udo (1755–c1835, r. 1787–1810) a direct descendant of Tadatoshi's younger brother Tatsutaka (1615–1645). In 1810, Narishige abdicated his title in favor of his elder son Naritatsu (1788–1826, r. 1810–1826), who succeeded as the ninth lord of Kumamoto. Naritatsu died without an heir in 1826, and was succeeded by his nephew Narimori (1804–1860, r. 1826–1860), the son of Naritatsu's younger brother Tatsuyuki (1784–1818), who was the seventh lord of Udo. Following the death of Narimori in 1860, his elder son Yoshikuni (1835–1876, r. 1860–1871) succeeded him as the eleventh and final ruling lord of Kumamoto. There were four major branches of the Hosokawa clan in the Edo period, each of which held the title of
daimyō. Another two branches of the family, under the Nagaoka surname, served the Hosokawa of Kumamoto as
karō. The residence of one of those families, , is still extant, and is a
Tangible Cultural Property of
Kumamoto Prefecture. ==Boshin War==