Hasekura Tsunenaga

Hasekura Rokuemon Tsunenaga (1571 – 1622) (Japanese: 支倉六右衛門常長, also spelled Faxecura Rocuyemon in period European sources, reflecting the contemporary pronunciation of Japanese) was a Japanese samurai and retainer of Date Masamune, the daimyo of Sendai. He led a diplomatic mission to New Spain (Mexico) and then Europe between 1613 and 1620 (called the Keichō Embassy, 慶長使節), after which he returned to Japan. He was the first Japanese official ambassador to the Americas and arguably Europe, and initiated the first recorded instance of Franco-Japanese relations.

Although Hasekura's embassy was cordially received in Europe, it happened at a time when Japan was moving toward the suppression of Christianity. European monarchs such as the King of Spain thus refused the trade agreements Hasekura had been seeking. Hasekura returned to Japan in 1620 and died of illness a year later, his embassy seemingly ending with few results in an increasingly isolationist Japan.

Japan's next embassy to Europe would only occur more than 200 years later, following two centuries of isolation, with the "First Japanese Embassy to Europe" in 1862.