Much has been written about the relationships between European men and local women in Asia, Africa, and Latin America during the heyday of western imperialism. But scholars have given slight attention to "interracial" relationships in a non-western country that avoided colonization, was regarded by Europeans as "white," and was able to generally maintain control over resident foreign male communities. This book describes and analyses intimate relationships between western men and Japanese women, for the most part in Japan, throughout the entire early modern period, and into the first several decades of the modern period when westerners came to reside in the Treaty Ports. Leupp discusses marriages between Japanese Catholic converts and Iberian adventurers; European's participation in sexual slavery; the provision of courtesans' services to the Dutch on Deshima; and the "temporary marriages" in the Treaty Ports after 1859, noting continuities in Japanese officials' attitudes and policies towards foreigner men and the Japanese women who came to associate with them.

Author Biography

Gary P. Leupp is Associate Professor of History at Tufts University. A Specialist in the social history of Tokugawa Japan (1603-1868), he has written widely on early modern Japan.