Shizuki Tadao

• Other Names: Nakano Ryûho
• Japanese: 志筑忠雄 (Shizuki Tadao)

Shizuki Tadao was a Rangaku scholar, best known for his 1801 text Sakokuron, the first work in Japanese to use the word "sakoku."

Shizuki worked for a time as a Dutch language interpreter in Nagasaki, and is known for his translations of a number of significant Western works, including selected writings of Isaac Newton and Johannes Kepler, translated in Shizuki's Rekishô shinsho.

Sakokuron was a translation of an essay written by Engelbert Kaempfer as an appendix to Kaempfer's History of Japan. Kaempfer characterized Japan's foreign policy as exclusionistic and isolationist, and discussed this favorably. Shizuki's own translator's notes indicate an attitude that isolationist policies were reasonable, logical steps to take to protect Japan from "having our customs disturbed and our fortunes plundered by foreigners."

References

• Mitani Hiroshi, David Noble (trans.), Escape from Impasse, International House of Japan (2006).