- Titles: Urasoe ôji ("Prince of Urasoe"); sessei
- Other Names: 尚元魯 (Shou Genro)
- Japanese: 浦添朝熹 (Urasoe Chouki)
Urasoe Chôki was a Ryukyuan aristocrat-bureaucrat, who served as sessei (royal advisor) from 1835 to 1852.
Chôki was a direct descendant of Shô Shôi, third son of King Shô Shin, making him a member of the highest rank of the aristocracy. He rose to the rank of ôji (prince)[1], and in 1842 served as the chief envoy (seishi) on a mission to Edo. While in Japan, Chôki studied waka under Kagawa Kageki, and is considered one of the Okinawa Sanjûrokkasen. While in Osaka on the return from that 1842 mission, he gifted a piece of calligraphy to the Osaka Tenmangû, reading: "Presented to the Tenman Shrine of Sugawara, in Naniwa, Dai-Nippon-koku / With favorable virtue / Tenpô 14 [1843] Kingly Government / respectfully written, Ryûkyû Kingdom sessei Shô Genro."[2] The object is now in the collection of the Okinawa Prefectural Museum.[3]
Chôki was also involved in a reprinting of Zhu Xi's commentaries on the Four Books. This 1845 republication of the Sishu jizhu was published by Satsuma Fugaku at the request or approval of Lord Shimazu Nariakira of Satsuma han, and contains a prologue by Hayashi Daigaku-no-kami Teiu, chief Confucian tutor and advisor to the shogunate, and an epilogue by Chôki.[4]
References
- "Urasoe Chôki." Digital-ban Nihon jinmei daijiten デジタル版 日本人名大辞典. Kodansha, 2009.
- ↑ The title of ôji in the system of Ryukyuan court ranks was not exclusive to direct biological sons of the royalty, but could also be earned by the highest-ranking aristocracy. This did not make him a "prince" in the sense of being considered "royalty" or entered into the line of succession, but gave him equivalent court ranking to the princes of the blood.
- ↑ 「大日本國浪華天満菅廟奉呈／徳馨／天保十四年癸卯王政／琉球國摂政尚元魯謹書」
- ↑ Watanabe Miki. "Nihon ni okeru Ryûkyû shiseki" 日本における琉球史跡. (personal webpage)
- ↑ Takatsu Takashi, “Ming Jianyang Prints and the Spread of the Teachings of Zhu Xi to Japan and the Ryukyu Kingdom in the Seventeenth Century,” in Angela Schottenhammer (ed.), The East Asian Mediterranean: Maritime Crossroads of Culture, Harrassowitz Verlag, 2008. 264.