Products that were first introduced to Japan via Hirado

Tobacco

The Spanish priests were the first to bring tobacco leaves to Japan. After importing them to Hirado in 1601, missionary Pietronimus De Castro presented tobacco leaves to Ieyasu Tokugawa. Hirado was the first location where tobacco leaves were imported into Japan and tobacco leaves might well have been presented to Lord Matsura Takanobu.

Original Imports from Hirado

Many foreign products were introduced to Japan via Hirado as it was one of the main trading ports for foreign trade. This is a short list of some of the products that are thought to be first seen and used in Hirado, before they were introduced to the rest of Japan.

Paint

In 1609, when the Dutch Trading Post was built, paint was used for the first time in Japan for the exterior walls. At that time, the Japanese were not familiar with paint being used to colour buildings, so they might have experienced a bit of a culture shock.

Sweet potatoes

When William Adams went to Southeast Asia on a trading mission in 1615, he landed on the Ryûkyû Islands (present Okinawa Prefecture) for repairs to his ship. There, he discovered the sweet potato and brought it back to Hirado as a gift for Richard Cocks, the head of the English Trading Post. Cocks planted the first sweet potatoes in Japan near Senrigahama on the island of Hirado.

Beer

In 1613, the English ship “The Clove” entered the harbour of Hirado. The beer, which was on the ship as beverage for the crew, was the first beer to be brought into Japan. It relieved the sailors of the hardships of the long journeys across the oceans.

Western medicines

Physicians on the ships that sailed to Hirado, who guarded over the health of the crew during the long time on sea, were among the first to bring knowledge of Western medicine to Japan. Hoan Arashiyama, a Hirado native of the Handa family, studied Western medicine and became well known as a groundbreaker for the study of Western medicine which was known as `Rangaku` (`Dutch Studies`) at the time.

The birth ground of Japanese Zen and Tea Eisai, the founder of the Japanese Rinzai school of Zen Buddhism, stayed in Hirado for several months on his way back from the Chinese Song Dynasty in 1191 and used the Fushun-an Temple as a base to spread his faith. He also planted the tea plant seeds he brought from China on the hill behind the temple and taught the Japanese about the manufacturing and usage of tea.

Bread

It was bread that a Portuguese ship brought to Japan as its main staple food in 1550. Later on, via Nagasaki city, the baking process and the specific taste of bread would spread throughout the whole of Japan to become a popular food.