春日
Kasuga

(wet nurse of the 3rd shōgun)

Kasuga no Tsubone was the woman who raised the 3^rd shōgun, Tokugawa Iemitsu. When she retired from her service at Edo Castle, she built a large estate in this area[i].

You’ll have to do a little walking, but this station gives you access to Tōkyō Dome and the famous Edo Period daimyō garden at 小石川後楽園 Koishikawa Kōrakuen and everything I mentioned about Iidabashi. It also gives you 伝通院 Denzū-in, the temple at which Tokugawa Ieyasu’s mother is interred as well as the notorious Bakumatsu douchebag known as Kiyokawa Hachirō.

This station also gives you access to 水道橋 Suidōbashi, a bridge that is named after an elevated aqueduct that delivered clean water to the Koishikawa district. There is a monument and a few traces of the aqueduct in the area, but most of the story of Suidōbashi is best told at the Tōkyō Waterworks Museum – which I talk about in the previous article and the next article.

If you’re up for a-walkin’, a 20-30 minute straight shot on foot up Kasuga Street will bring you to 茗荷谷 Myōgadani[ii], literally “ginger valley.” There are some temples in the area related to the Tokugawa and a stone lantern commemorating the Christian Mansion. Christian Mansion sounds like a lovely place to live, but in fact, it was a prison and torture center established as the shōgunate enacted the final expulsion of Christians from the country[iii].

Further Reading:

• Wanna read my original article about Kiyokawa Hachirō?
• Wanna read my article about Kiyokawa Hachirō’s grave?
• Wanna read my original article about Kasuga Street?
• Wanna read my original article about Myōgadani ?
• Wanna read my original article about Koishikawa?
• Wanna read my original article about Suidōbashi?

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This article is part of an ongoing series that starts here.

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[i] Here’s my article about Kasuga Street.
[ii] It will be a hike. Myōgadani is best accessed by the 丸之内線 Marunouchi-sen Marunouchi Line.
[iii] In fact, Christianity continued to exist in small underground pockets here or there throughout the Edo Period, despite being expressly prohibited by the shōgunate.