106 | December 2021 www.facs.website two research books are excellent sources for further research of Udagawa Yōan. Udagawa’s successful pioneering of chemistry translation and terminology served as a milestone on the road towards Japanese modernization. Seimi or kagaku? Chemistry in Tokugawa Japan after Udagawa As discussed above, Udagawa Yōan coined a variety of chemical terms still used today, but arguably the most important of his coinage eventually became obsolete: seimi 舎密, meaning chemistry, included in the title of his opus magnum.16 It was the transliteration of a Dutch word for chemistry, chemie, and was widely used as such until the early Meiji period. Another term for chemistry, kagaku 化學 (“the study of change”) was first used in Japan by Kawamoto Kōmin 川本幸民 (1810-71). Being aware of the emergence of a Chinese term for chemistry, huaxue 化學, in the 1850s, Kawamoto adopted the Japanese reading of huaxue, kagaku, as part of the title of his chemistry books. The most well-known of Kawamoto’s works, Kagaku shinsho (“A new book of chemistry,” 1861) is a Japanese translation from the Dutch translation of Die Schule der Chemie (1846) by Julius Adolph Stöckhardt (1809-86). Through Kagaku shinsho he updated Japanese chemistry by transmitting Dalton’s chemical atomism with the stoichiometric concept of atomic weights and equivalents and the electrochemical dualism of Berzelius. The fact that Kawamoto worked at the Tokugawa Shogunate’s Bansho Shirabesho (“Institute for the Study of Barbarian Books”) from its establishment in 1856 was an important factor in kagaku becoming the current Japanese term for chemistry. That did not happen overnight. When a section of the Bansho Shirabesho devoted to chemistry was established in 1860, it was named the Seiren kata (“Department of Refining”). The Seiren kata assumed the new name Kagaku kata (“Department of Chemistry”) in 1865, indicating that kagaku established itself as the term for chemistry in this institution around this year. The Bansho Shirabesho (renamed the Yōsho Shirabesho in 1860 and Kaiseijo in 1865) was one of the antecedent schools of Tokyo University, established in 1877,17 and Tokyo Imperial University, established in 1886.18 Former professors and students at the Kaiseijo dominated Japanese education mostly as university administrators and education officials in the early Meiji period, ensuring that kagaku became a wide-spread translation for chemistry by the mid-Meiji period. Kawamoto was also a good example of how Western chemistry got related to Japanese industrialization in the 1850s and 1860s.19 His first chemical work, Heika sudoku seimi shingen (“A true foundation of chemistry that military officers should read”) in 1856, was translated from the Dutch translation of Moritz Meyer’s Grundzüge der Militair-Chemie (1834) with a strong emphasis on combustion and gunpowder and was widely used in Japan as a textbook of chemistry for training in Westernstyle artillery. Kawamoto was also involved with the production of matches, beer, telegraphs, and photographs with his extensive knowledge of chemistry and physics. By the 1860s Western chemistry became an essential part of the Japanese endeavor for industrialization for both military and peaceful purposes. Institutionalization of Higher Chemical Education in Meiji Japan Western-style higher education in science and technology, chemistry not the least, was fully established in the Meiji period between 1868 and 1912. As we discussed above in the case of Kawamoto and kagaku, there were connections between the pre-Meiji Kaiseijo and Tokyo Imperial University, the pillar of early Meiji higher education. The same applies to the Igakusho (“The Medical Institute”), another antecedent school of Tokyo Imperial University. However, there were also discontinuities as the scientific and technical education and research at Tokyo University and other institutions created in the Meiji period were undertaken by foreign professors (who taught in Western languages, usually their mother tongues) and their Japanese students.20,21 Four institutions, all established in the 1870s, were particularly important for the development of Japanese chemistry and eventually converged into Tokyo Imperial University in the 1880s and early 1890s. 1) The Faculty of Medicine at TokyoUniversity (successor institution of the Igakusho and Tokyo Medical School) became the College of Medicine at Tokyo Imperial University in 1886, including a Department of Pharmacy and a chair in medical chemistry. Chemistry was taught there first by the German, Alexander Langgaard (1847-1917), and later by the Dutch Johan Frederik Eijkman (1851-1915).22 2) The Faculty of Science at Tokyo University (successor institution of the Kaiseijo and Tokyo Kaisei School) became the College of Science at Tokyo, including the Department of Chemistry. Chemistry was taught there by the British, Robert William Atkinson (1850-1929), the German Georg Hermann Ritter (1827-74), and Frank Fanning Jewett (1844-1926) from the United States. 3) The Imperial College of Engineering, Tokyo, became the core of the College of Engineering, including the Department of Applied Chemistry. Chemistry was taught by the British chemist Edward Divers (1837-1912) who later became professor at the College of Science, Tokyo Imperial University. 4) The Komaba Agricultural School (renamed the Tokyo Agricultural and Forestry School in 1886 by merger with the Tokyo Forestry School) became Tokyo’s College of Agriculture in 1890, including a Department of Agricultural Chemistry. Chemistry was taught at Komaba first by the British chemist Edward Kinch (18481920) and later by the German, Oskar Kellner (1851-1911). These four institutions produced the first generation of Japanese chemists who established the first chemical society in Japan, the Tokyo Kagakukai or Tokyo Chemical Society in 1878.23 It was renamed the Chemical Society of Japan in 1921 and has become the national society for chemistry in Japan. The second imperial university, Kyoto Imperial University, was established in 1897, followed by Tohoku (est. 1907), Kyushu (est. 1911), Hokkaido (est. 1918),24 Keijō (est. 1924 in today’s Seoul, Republic of Korea), Taihoku (est. 1928 in today’s Taipei, Republic of China), Osaka (est. 1931), and Nagoya (est. 1939). These nine imperial universities (seven inland and two colonial) and their successor institutions were major, if not the only, players in the history of science in Japan (and in Korea and Taiwan) in the pre-World-War-II and later periods. Meiji Japan’s Practical Chemists in Pharmacy, Industry and Agriculture Figure 3: Nagai Nagayoshi. Courtesy of the Ochanomizu University History Museum As chemistry became an essential part of Japanese industrialization, it is unsurprising that a large number of young talents were drawn to the practical fields of chemistry such as pharmaceutical, industrial and agricultural chemistry. Nagai Nagayoshi 長井長義 (18441929), for example, was a pioneering Japanese organic chemist with strong interests in pharmacy. Originally from the Awa Domain in today’s Tokushima Prefecture, he was trained first with Dutch medical doctors in Nagasaki and then attended the Tokyo Medical School for a short period. Nagai was then sent to Germany for overseas study and studied organic chemistry at the University of Berlin
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