Events on August 2 in history

Edo society (August 2, 1869)

Japan's Edo society class system is abolished as part of the Meiji Restoration reforms.

Edo society refers to the society of Japan under the rule of the Tokugawa Shogunate during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868.

Edo society was a feudal society with strict social stratification, customs, and regulations intended to promote political stability. Japanese people were assigned into a hierarchy of social classes based on the Four Occupations that were hereditary. The Emperor of Japan and the kuge were the official ruling class of Japan but had no power. The Shōgun of the Tokugawa clan, the daimyō, and their retainers of the samurai class administered Japan through their system of domains. The majority of Edo society were commoners divided into peasant, craftsmen, and merchant classes, and various "untouchable" groups.

The Bakumatsu from 1853 on led to growing opposition to the Edo system and it was dismantled after the Meiji Restoration in 1868.

References

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Events on 1869

6 Mar

Periodic table
Dmitri Mendeleev presents the first periodic table to the Russian Chemical Society.
28 Apr

First Transcontinental Railroad
Chinese and Irish laborers for the Central Pacific Railroad working on the First Transcontinental Railroad lay ten miles of track in one day, a feat which has never been matched.
15 May

Susan B. Anthony
Women's suffrage: In New York, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton form the National Woman Suffrage Association.
17 Nov

Suez Canal
In Egypt, the Suez Canal, linking the Mediterranean Sea with the Red Sea, is inaugurated.
22 Nov

Clipper
In Dumbarton, Scotland, the clipper Cutty Sark is launched and is one of the last clippers ever built, and the only one still surviving today.

Events on August 2 in history

Edo society (August 2, 1869)

References

Choose Another Date

Events on 1869

Periodic table

First Transcontinental Railroad

Susan B. Anthony

Suez Canal

Clipper