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Edo map
Map of edo. Edo map (Kantō - Japan) to print. Edo map (Kantō - Japan) to download. Edo (江戸 Edo?, literally "bay-entrance" or "estuary"), also romanized as Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of the Japanese capital Tokyo as its shown in Edo map. Edo was seat of power for the Tokugawa shogunate, which ruled Japan from 1603 to 1868. During this period Edo grew to become one of the largest cities in the world and home to an urban culture centered on the notion of a "floating world".
Edo was repeatedly devastated by fires, with the Great Fire of Meireki in 1657 (in which an estimated 100,000 people died) the most disastrous. During the Edo period there were about 100 fires (most begun by accident, often quickly escalating and spreading through neighbourhoods of wooden machiya which were heated with charcoal fires. Between 1600 and 1945, Edo/Tokyo was leveled every 25–50 years or so by fire, earthquakes, tsunami, volcanic eruptions or war (see Edo map).
The Edo period corresponds to the reign of the Tokugawa shogunate (1603-1867), which chose Edo (now Tokyo) as its capital (see Edo map), the former imperial capital being Kyoto. Edo period was marked by a policy of isolation of the country, called sakoku, which aimed at establishing political power by prohibiting exchanges with the outside world and by escaping the danger represented by the propensity of Europeans to spread Christianity.