Katana VentraIP

Emperor Taishō

Yoshihito (Japanese: 嘉仁, 31 August 1879 – 25 December 1926), posthumously honored as Emperor Taishō (大正天皇, Taishō-tennō), was the 123rd Emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession, reigning from 1912 until his death in 1926. The era he presided over is known as the Taishō era.

"Yoshihito" redirects here. For other uses, see Yoshihito (name).

Emperor Taishō
大正天皇

30 July 1912 – 25 December 1926

10 November 1915

Crown Prince Hirohito (1921‍–‍1926)

Yoshihito, Prince Haru
(明宮嘉仁親王)
(1879-08-31)31 August 1879
Tōgū Palace, Akasaka, Tokyo, Empire of Japan

25 December 1926(1926-12-25) (aged 47)
Imperial Villa, Hayama, Kanagawa, Empire of Japan

(m. 1900)

Born to Emperor Meiji and his concubine Yanagiwara Naruko, Yoshihito was proclaimed crown prince in 1888, his two older siblings having died in infancy. In May 1900, he married Kujō Sadako, a member of the Kujō family of the Fujiwara clan. The couple had four sons: Hirohito, Yasuhito, Nobuhito and Takahito.


When his father died in July 1912, Yoshihito—then 32 years old—ascended the Chrysanthemum Throne and became emperor of Japan. Suffering from neurological issues for the better part of his life, he played only a limited role in politics and from 1919 on undertook no official duties. His reign was characterized by a liberal and democratic shift in political power known as Taishō Democracy. It also saw Japan's entrance in the First World War and the Great Kantō earthquake of 1923.


Yoshihito's declining health led to the appointment of his eldest son, Crown Prince Hirohito as prince regent in 1921. He spent the rest of his life as a recluse. Yoshihito died of a heart attack at the age of 47 following a bout of pneumonia in December 1926, and was succeeded by Hirohito.

Grand Cordon of the , 3 November 1889;[24] Collar, 10 May 1900[25]

Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum

3rd class, 1 April 1906[26]

Order of the Golden Kite

Taishō period

Hammer, Joshua. (2006). New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-0-7432-6465-5 (cloth)

Yokohama Burning: the Deadly 1923 Earthquake and Fire that Helped Forge the Path to World War II.

. (1990). Tokyo Rising. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-394-54360-4 (cloth) [reprinted by Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1991: ISBN 978-0-674-89461-7 (paper)]

Seidensticker, Edward

Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan. Harper Perennial (2001). ISBN 0-06-093130-2

Bix, Herbert P.

Fujitani, T. Splendid Monarchy: Power and Pageantry in Modern Japan. University of California Press; Reprint edition (1998).  0-520-21371-8

ISBN

. Emperor Of Japan: Meiji And His World, 1852–1912. Columbia University Press (2005). ISBN 0-231-12341-8

Keene, Donald

in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW

Newspaper clippings about Emperor Taishō