Kirishitan

The Japanese term , from Portuguese cristão (cf. Kristang), meaning "Christian", referred to Catholic Christians in Japanese and is used in Japanese texts as a historiographic term for Catholics in Japan in the 16th and 17th centuries.

Key facts

Religious group.group: Kirishitan吉利支丹, 切支丹, キリシタン
Religious group.image: 300px
Religious group.caption: Japanese Christians in Portuguese costume, 16th–17th century.
Religious group.founder: Portuguese and Spanish missionaries
Religious group.popplace: Japan, Philippines (exiled population)
Religious group.langs: Latin, Japanese
Religious group.rels: Catholic Christianity
Religious group.scrips: The Bible

via Wikipedia infobox

~22 min read

Encyclopedic overview

19 sections

Contents

History
Background
Line of demarcations between Portugal and Spain
Propagation strategy
Early policy toward Catholicism
Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the Christian ''daimyōs''
Expansion
Tokugawa response
Later persecution
Rediscovery and return
Kirishitan grave in Minamishimabara
Notable Kirishitans
Kirishitan ''daimyōs''
Other
See also
Citations
General and cited references
Further reading
External links

Modern Japanese has several words for "Christian", of which the most common are the noun form キリスト教徒, and also クリスチャン. The Japanese word キリシタン is used primarily in Japanese texts for the early history of Roman Catholicism in Japan, or in relation to Kakure Kirishitan, hidden Christians. However, English sources on histories of Japan generally use the term "Christian" without distinction.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Kirishitan” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.