Japanese mission to New Spain and Europe in the Keicho Years

The article is devoted to the so-called Keicho Embassy Japanese mission to Europe, led by Hasekura Rokuemon Tsunenaga, who earned broad popularity as the first Japanese diplomat in Europe. Hasekura Rokuemon Tsunenaga was a Japanese samurai and retainer of Date Masamune. In the years 1613 through 1620, Hasekura headed a diplomatic mission to Spain and the Vatican, traveling through New Spain (arriving in Acapulco and departing from Veracruz) and visiting various ports-of-call in Europe. On the return trip, Hasekura and his companions re-traced their route across New Spain in 1619, sailing from Acapulco for Manila, and then sailing north to Japan in 1620. He is conventionally considered the first Japanese ambassador to the Americas and Spain. Although Hasekura's embassy was cordially received in Spain and Rome, it happened at a time when Japan was moving toward the suppression of Christianity. European monarchs, such as the King of Spain, thus refused the trade agreements Hasekura had been seeking. Hasekura returned to Japan in 1620 and died of illness two years later, his embassy seemingly ending with few results in an increasingly isolationist Japan. The objective of the Japanese embassy was both to discuss trade agreements with the Spanish crown in Madrid, and to meet with the Pope in Rome. Sotelo, in his own account of the travel, emphasizes the religious dimension of the mission, claiming that the main objective was to spread the Christian faith in northern Japan. When in April 1616 Hasekura met with the King of Spain for the second time, the king declined to sign a trade agreement on the ground that the Japanese Embassy did not appear to be an official embassy from the Tokugawa ruler of Japan. Japan's next embassy to Europe would only occur in 1862, more than 220 years later and following two centuries of isolation.