Edo Five Routes

The were the five major roads (kaidō) that started at Edo (now Tokyo) during the Edo period, the most important of which was the Tōkaidō which linked Edo and Kyoto. Tokugawa Ieyasu started the construction of these five routes in order to increase his control over the country in 1601, but it was Tokugawa Ietsuna, the 4th shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate and Ieyasu's great-grandson, who declared them as major routes.
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