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カテゴリー1： 8. Schools, Groups, and Personalities
カテゴリー2： Personalities
Title
Motoda Nagazane
Text (1818-91)
Confucian scholar of the late Edo period and early Meiji era and lecturer to the Emperor Meiji. He had the style name Shichū and epistolary names Higashino and Chayō. Born in 1818 in Higo Province (present-day Kumamoto Prefecture) as the eldest son of a retainer to the Kumamoto domain. He first undertook studies at the Jishūkan domainal academy, then focused on the practical sciences under the instruction of Yoshiyama Sariyō. The famous Yokoi Shōnan was a student at the academy at the same time, and apparently had a great influence on Motoda.
After completing his studies, Motoda became family heir and was given the post of Kyoto Dispatch Commissioner (kyōto rusu kyoyaku); in 1868 he became a domainal aide and magistrate, and in 1870 was raised to the position of lecturer to the domainal lord. The following year he was transferred to the Kunaishō (Imperial Household Ministry), where he gave an inaugural lecture to the Emperor Meiji, and for twenty years thereafter instructed the imperial house in Confucianism.
During this period he held the successive posts of kōgō goyōgakari (Special Consultant to the Empress), kūchū komonkan (Advising Minister of the Imperial Court), sūmitsuin komonkan (Advising Minister to the Secret Council) and kunaishō goyōgakari (Special Consultant to the Imperial Household Ministry).
In Yōgaku kōyō (Essentials of Elementary Education), an edict issued to every primary school in the nation in 1882, Nagazane emphasized the notion of repayment of obligations, specifically emphasizing the Confician virtues of filial piety and loyalty as core values. Motoda also contributed a draft for the Imperial Rescript on Education (Kyōiku chokugo), in which he argued from the point of view of Confucian morality for the importance of direct rule by the emperor. He died January 22, 1891, at the age of seventy-four.

- Yazaki Hiroyuki

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