Pre-modern period
The area around present-day Yokosuka city has been inhabited for thousands of years. Archaeologists have found stone tools and shell middens from the Japanese Paleolithic period and ceramic shards from the J?mon and Kofun periods at numerous locations in the area. During the Heian period, local warlord Muraoka Tamemichi established Kinugasa Castle in 1063. He became the ancestor of the Miura clan, which subsequently dominated eastern Sagami Province for the next several hundred years. The Miura clan supported Minamoto no Yoritomo in the foundation of the Kamakura shogunate, but were later annihilated by H?j? Tokiyori in 1247. However, the family name was reassigned to a supporter of the H?j? clan, and the Miura continued to rule Miura Peninsula through the Muromachi period until their defeat at Arai Castle in a 1518 attack by H?j? S?un. Following the defeat of the Late H?j? clan at the Battle of Odawara, Toyotomi Hideyoshi transferred Tokugawa Ieyasu to take control over the Kant? region, including Yokosuka in 1590.
The adventurer William Adams (inspiration for a character in the novel Sh?gun), the first Briton to set foot in Japan, arrived at Uraga aboard the Dutch trading vessel Liefde in 1600. In 1612, he was granted the title of samurai and a fief in Hemi within the boundaries of present-day Yokosuka, due to his services to the Tokugawa shogunate. A monument to William Adams (called Miura Anjin in Japanese) is a local landmark in Yokosuka.
During the Edo period, Yokosuka tenry? territory controlled directly by the Tokugawa shogunate, but administered through various hatamoto. Due to its strategic location at the entrance to Tokyo Bay, the Shogunate established the post of Uraga Bugy? in 1720, and all shipping into the bay was required to stop for inspection. As concerns over the increasing number of incursions by foreign vessels and attempts to end Japan's self-imposed national seclusion policy, the Shogunate
