SHOGUN: John Blackthorne REAL STORY Explained

the first two episodes of Shogun were recently released and as First episodes go it's definitely up there it provided solid foundations to a story which is centered around hunger for power and a battle between religions and leaders in 17th century Japan one of the characters that we were introduced to was the Protestant Englishman called John Blackthorne I found his situation to be extremely interesting and it prompted me to look a bit deeper into the character and the real life person that it was based on the story of the real person which inspired John Blackthorne is a story that just doesn't sound like it could exist and I thought I'd delve into it so let's Jump On In Here is Shogun John Blackthorn the real story explained just to let you know this video will contain spoilers so the character of John Blackthorne is actually based on a real person that's a part of History this is William Adams who was born in 1564 and died in May 1620 at the age of 55 which is nearly 20 years older than the average life expectancy at the time he came from a ship building an astronomy and a navigation background in Gillingham before he eventually joined the Royal Navy and whilst in the Navy he was in service during England's war with Spain against the Spanish Armada in 1588 10 years later in 1598 he went on an expedition to the Far East with a five ship Fleet which was connected to the Dutch trade with India the Dutch and English were allies at the time due to them both being Protestant countries and were both fighting against Spain if we then go forward by two years that then brings us to the timeline of where we were first introduced to John in the show in the year 1600 after being at sea for over a year and a half there were 23 men that were either sick or were dying and they managed to anchor down off of an island called kyushi in Japan on board the ship they had a variety of different Goods whether that be trade goods tools or weapons for example they had 19 Cannon which was referenced in the TV show although it was rounded up to 20 however they also had 5,000 Cannon balls and several hundred muskets so you can understand where the fear of a threat was coming from out of the 100 crew that originally set sail 23 were sick or dying but when they got to Japan there were only nine that actually survived when they arrived just off of bungo like what was depicted in the show there was a relatively hostile response towards the crew and there were Japanese locals and Portuguese Jesuit missionary priests claiming that William and his crew were pirates and that they should be executed for that reason the religious rivalry was something that was present between the Jesuit and other Catholic members and William they took a natural distaste for William due to the fact that he was a Protestant or at least they labeled him as that as we know from history the 30-year War took place throughout Europe in the mid-1600s and that same kind of mindset was present in this small encounter here on a more intimate scale they felt like William was a threat to the hold that they were trying to get over the Japanese people and the development of Catholicism in Japan they wanted to grow the Catholic Church there but William was now somebody that was in their way the remainder of the crew were held as prisoners in Osaka Castle something which is different to the show as they seem to just be kept where they were originally Shipwrecked rather than escorted to a sucker along with Jon but that might change as the season goes on William was taken to meet Tokugawa leesu the real person that toranaga is based on Leu was the guardian of the son of the Tao that had recently died just like what we also saw in the first two episodes of the show where toranaga was looking out for yio until he became of age to rule it's said that Leu met with William Adams on several occasions between the months of May and June in the year 1600 and was questioned about his extensive knowledge on ships ship building and navigation something which was condensed into one conversation in the show in a letter that the real William Adams wrote to his wife about when he met with Leu he said things like he viewed me well he made many signs onto me some of which I understood and some I did did not he demanded me of what land I was and what moved us to come to his land being so far off then he asked whether our country had Wars I answered him yeah with the Spaniards and portugals but being in peace with all other nations he asked me Diverse other questions of things of religions and many other things as what way we came to the country having a chart of the whole world I showed him through the straight of melan and which he wondered and thought me to lie so it showed that the conversation that we saw present in episode 2 where John was mapping out what he knew of the world it was most likely drawn from the letter that William Adams actually wrote to his wife about when he sat down to meet with the ASU William also said that LE ASU denied the request for his execution because there were no reasonable grounds the countries were not at war with each other and William hadn't done any harm or damage to the land so he ignored the Catholics claiming that he should be killed for being a pirate the ship that William and the crew arrived on that was Shipwrecked in Bongo was something which the U ordered the crew to sell to Ido where it didn't actually complete the journey due to it being in a condition Beyond saving so it inevitably sank in the waters this is really where the first two episodes of the show concluded obviously not with us seeing the ship sinking or being sailed back cuz we didn't see that a few years later William Adams was ordered to help build Japan's first western style ship which was completed and it was built to the size of being 80 tons it was then the next year where Adams was tasked with building a larger ship which was 120 tons something that wasn't that far off the size of the ship that William arrived on with regards to the other survivors that William arrived in Japan with many of them were allowed to leave Japan in the year 16005 and most of them chose to do so this next part will have spoilers for what could be coming up in the show so proceed with caution if you don't want to know what happened after the Shogun had grown to trust William Adams he eventually appointed him as a diplomatic and trade advisor and he became his personal adviser for all things that were connected to the Western World William Adams even became the official interpreter showing that he learned the language embraced the culture and viewed the country completely differently to how he did when he first arrived he would wear Japanese attire and when other Englishmen later arrived he preferred to be around the Japanese people he was eventually given permission to enter the palace whenever he pleased and was able to speak with the ASU as and when even though Tokugawa respected Adams he didn't actually allow him to leave the country like many of the other crew members were given permission to do instead for his loyalty skills knowledge and Trust he was given two swords which meant that he had the authority of the Samurai this meant that William as he was formerly known was dead and a samurai was born making him known under a different identity even though William wasn't allowed to leave he still sent payments to his wife Mary back home in England with his new life and identity being in Japan he did go on to marry somebody else whilst there and he went on to have two children with them a son and a daughter in letters that William wrote he mentioned how he respected and cared a lot for the people of Japan and their civilization I imagine this is something that we're going to be seeing in the show one of the first lines that the character John Blackthorne said when he arrived there was that he referred to them as Savages but I feel we're going to see that mindset change and he'll grow to respect them even in the couple of episodes that we've had we've seen that mindset shift and a level of respect get formed as well as the relationship building that William did with Tokugawa he also contributed to the development and establishment of trading rights and passes which connected to other nations so as you can see there are quite a lot of similarities in the true tale of William Adams which inspired the fictional character of John Blackthorne as well William had a son named JN so I wonder if that's why they included the name of JN in the fictional version of the character it's interesting researching about the story after watching the first two episodes because you can quite literally see it being told in a very similar way to how it was documented I'm intrigued to see how deep they're going to go with John Blackthorne as it seems as though the show is focusing on many different things so it's going to be interesting for sure so there you have it Shogun John Blackthorne the real story explained if you want to see more videos on Shogun then click on the card in the top corner I'll be covering the show every week so be sure to come back for weekly breakdowns of the episode my episode 1 and two breakdowns in the top corner right now what did you think of the first two episodes of the show do you reckon it's going to live up to the hype that it's got let me know your thoughts in the comment below and thanks for tuning into the video I'll see you in the next one

Channel: BrainPilot

Views: 126,778

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Id: hqzxbRTkC2w

Length: 8min 32sec (512 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 29 2024