Japan is a new country?

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 Today's finding

I could say Japan is rather a new country. Today I heard a very interesting story about Japan.
That is...

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Japan had a national isolation policy during the Edo Period (1603~1867) when the Tokukgawa military government controlled the country. And in 1867, when the last 15th shogun, Yoshinobu Tokugawa returned the sovereign to the Emperor, Japan opened to the world dramatically and struggled to modernize in a rapid speed in order to follow other industrialized countries.

But until then, people hadn't had the idea as a country because Japan had consisted of over 200 different feudal domains called "han" under the Tokugawa government. Each "han" was independent and had a typical characteristic and specialties based on its climate and topography, etc. People served for their feudal lords, not for the Tokugawa shogun.

So the new government tried to create a new vision that Japan is a united country. Japanese-style room, Japanese food, Japanese hairstyle....These expressions were created at that time to compare with Western-style.