Tobacco

• Japanese: 煙草 (tabako)

Tobacco was first introduced to Japan in the mid-16th century by the Portuguese. It spread rapidly and was widely smoked in the Edo period, using long, thin, small-bowled pipes called kiseru. In fact, tobacco became so popular that its cultivation became regulated by the shogunate.

References

• Arai Hakuseki, Joyce Ackroyd (trans.), Told Round a Brushwood Fire, University of Tokyo Press (1979), 297n278.