The Ōshū Kaidō (奥州街道) was one of the centrally administered five routes of the Edo period. It was built to connect the de facto capital of Japan at Edo (modern-day Tokyo) with Mutsu Province and the present-day city of Shirakawa, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. It was established by Tokugawa Ieyasu for government officials traveling through the area.

Subroutes

In addition to the established use of traveling from Edo to Mutsu Province, there were also many roads that connected from the Ōshū Kaidō. One such sub-route was the Sendaidō (仙台道), which connected Mutsu Province with Sendai. The terminus for the Sendaidō is in Aoba-ku in modern Sendai. From there, the Matsumaedō (松前道) connected Sendai with Hakodate, Hokkaidō. Though the Ōshū Kaidō has only 27 post stations, there were over 100 designated post stations when the subroutes are included.

Travel

In the early Edo period, travel along the road mostly consisted of magistrates heading towards Edo in order to take part in sankin kōtai. After Hakodate's development, the late Edo period saw travel further increase as a result of increasing trade with Russia. Nowadays, the path of the Ōshū Kaidō and its extensions is followed by National Route 4 from Tokyo to Aomori via Sendai and National Route 280 from Aomori to Minamya.

Stations of the Ōshū Kaidō

The 27 stations of the Ōshū Kaidō are listed below in order and are divided by their modern-day prefecture. The first seventeen stations are shared with the Nikkō Kaidō. The present day municipality is listed afterwards in parentheses.

Tokyo

Saitama Prefecture

Ibaraki Prefecture

Tochigi Prefecture

Fukushima Prefecture