Saga Domain

Saga Domain (佐賀藩, Saga-han^?), also known as Hizen Domain, was a Japanese domain in the Edo period. It is associated with Hizen Province in modern-day Saga Prefecture on the island of Kyushu.

In the han system, Saga was a political and economic abstraction based on periodic cadastral surveys and projected agricultural yields. In other words, the domain was defined in terms of kokudaka, not land area. This was different from the feudalism of the West.

The Nabeshima clan were originally vassals of the Ryūzōji clan who controlled the region. However, Ryūzōji Takanobu was killed in battle with the Shimazu and Arima clans in 1584, and Nabeshima Naoshige became the guardian of Takanobu's young heir, Ryūzōji Takafusa. Six years later, Toyotomi Hideyoshi granted approval for Nabeshima to overthrow Ryūzōji and seize the territory for his own lineage. Nabeshima supported Hideyoshi's invasions of Korea in the 1590s, and fought in the Western Army, against the Tokugawa clan in the fateful battle of Sekigahara in 1600. During this battle, however, he turned against and captured Western Army general Tachibana Muneshige, earning some degree of favor from Tokugawa Ieyasu and being allowed to keep his fief. The domain was governed from Saga Castle in the capital city of Saga by the Nabeshima clan of tozama daimyō. Though the Dutch and Chinese trading posts in Nagasaki were overseen directly by officials of the Tokugawa shogunate, the domain was largely responsible for the military defense of the city and the port.

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