The Jesuit Mission in Hirado and the Vanished Christians of Takushima- A Historical and Anthropological Research-

According to the records of the Jesuit Mission in Japan, there were at least 350 Christians living at Takushima Island in the Hirado domain. From the end of the 16th century, Chancellor Toyotomi Hideyoshi started the prosecution of the Christian church, and this policy was continued and intensified by the Tokugawa shogunate. As a result of this prosecution there were no Christians left on the island at the end of the 17th century. The fate of those 350 remains uncertain. This paper will show the activities of the Jesuit mission in Hirado as recorded by 長崎大学言語教育研究センター紀要 第 3 号 － － 38 the Jesuits themselves and through participant observation research of the ‘Bongôrei ’ Obon-festival and oral traditions of the island, discuss the fate of these vanished Christians