was a prominent weapons merchant in the Japanese port town of Sakai

Sakai, Osaka

is a city in Osaka Prefecture, Japan. It has been one of the largest and most important seaports of Japan since the Medieval era.Following the February 2005 annexation of the town of Mihara, from Minamikawachi District, the city has grown further and is now the fourteenth most populous city in...

, and master of the Japanese tea ceremony

Japanese tea ceremony

The Japanese tea ceremony, also called the Way of Tea, is a Japanese cultural activity involving the ceremonial preparation and presentation of matcha, powdered green tea. In Japanese, it is called . The manner in which it is performed, or the art of its performance, is called...

. He was also known by the names Imai Hiratsuna and Imai Kanehisa.

Sōkun was the son of weapons merchant and tea master Imai Sōkyū

Imai Sokyu

was an important 16th century merchant in the Japanese port town of Sakai, and a master of the tea ceremony. His yagō was Naya.A relative of the Amago and Sasaki samurai clans, Sōkyū originally came from Yamato Province. After settling in Sakai, he studied the tea ceremony under Takeno Jōō,...

, and carried on from his father in both capacities. He also followed his father in being an advisor and tea master to Toyotomi Hideyoshi

Toyotomi Hideyoshi

was a daimyo warrior, general and politician of the Sengoku period. He unified the political factions of Japan. He succeeded his former liege lord, Oda Nobunaga, and brought an end to the Sengoku period. The period of his rule is often called the Momoyama period, named after Hideyoshi's castle...

. Following Hideyoshi's death in 1598, he came to serve Tokugawa Ieyasu

Tokugawa Ieyasu

 was the founder and first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan , which ruled from the Battle of Sekigahara  in 1600 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Ieyasu seized power in 1600, received appointment as shogun in 1603, abdicated from office in 1605, but...

, who named him a hatamoto

Hatamoto

A was a samurai in the direct service of the Tokugawa shogunate of feudal Japan. While all three of the shogunates in Japanese history had official retainers, in the two preceding ones, they were referred to as gokenin. However, in the Edo period, hatamoto were the upper vassals of the Tokugawa...

and granted him an estate worth 1,300 koku

Koku

The is a Japanese unit of volume, equal to ten cubic shaku. In this definition, 3.5937 koku equal one cubic metre, i.e. 1 koku is approximately 278.3 litres. The koku was originally defined as a quantity of rice, historically defined as enough rice to feed one person for one year...

. Sōkun also helped to organize the dispatch of red seal ships

Red seal ships

were Japanese armed merchant sailing ships bound for Southeast Asian ports with a red-sealed patent issued by the early Tokugawa shogunate in the first half of the 17th century...

, trading ships formally authorized by the shogunate

Tokugawa shogunate

The Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the and the , was a feudal regime of Japan established by Tokugawa Ieyasu and ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family. This period is known as the Edo period and gets its name from the capital city, Edo, which is now called Tokyo, after the name was...

to trade with the mainland.