Samukawa Tatsukiyo (1697–1739)

Samukawa Tatsukiyo was a Confucian and Japanese classic scholar.

He was born in 1697 in Aburanokoji-Demizu in Kyoto as the second son of the Nakamura family, the governor of Tosa Province. Later he became a son-in-law of Samukawa Tatsunari, the feudal retainer of the Zeze Domain, and Tatsukiyo was taken into his wife’s family. He served as a teacher for two generations of the feudal lords of the Zeze Domain, Honda Yasunobu and Yasutoshi, and was paid 200-koku worth of rice [approximately 36,000 liters].

He began editing Omi Yochi Shiryaku (a topography of Omi) in 1723 and completed it in 1734 after more than 10 years of dedication. After completion, the set of books were treated as secret books of the Zeze Domain. Later the books were offered to the Shogunate in 1798 and opened to the public. The set consists of 101 volumes in a total of 100 books. Its contents include the outlines of the history and geography of the whole Omi Province, the locations and topography of each village of the counties beginning from Shiga County, famous historical places, shrines, temples and historical events. It is regarded as the topographic dictionary of Omi Province and an essential basic source material for research of the local history of Shiga Prefecture. The set of the finalized books that had been handwritten by Tatsukiyo was designated as a Prefectural Tangible Cultural Property.