until the interdiction of Christianity by Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1614, when 300 Japanese Christian refugees under Takayama Ukon settled in the Philippines. On 8 November 1614, together with 300 Japanese Christians Takayama Ukon left his home country from Nagasaki. He arrived at Manila on 21 December and was greeted warmly by the Spanish Jesuits and the local Filipinos there. The Spanish Philippines offered its assistance in overthrowing the Japanese government by invasion to protect Japanese Catholics. Justo declined to participate and died of illness just 40 days afterward. These 17th-century immigrants are at the origin of some of today's 200,000-strong Japanese population in the Philippines. More rebellions such as one known as the Tondo conspiracy by Filipinos against Spain, had Japanese merchants and Christians involved, but the conspiracy was disbanded. Toyotomi Hideyoshi threatened the Spanish to leave or face full scale Japanese invasion, however, this was near his decline and death. The Tokugawa Shogunate rose in power right after. In the 17th century (1633 & 1635), Japan established an isolationist (sakoku) policy, and contacts between the two nations were severed until after the opening of Japan in 1854. In the 16th and 17th centuries, thousands of Japanese traders also migrated to the Philippines and assimilated into the local population. In 1888, Filipino national hero Jose Rizal arrived in Japan and had a relationship with Seiko Usui (Osei-san), a daughter of a samurai. Philippines and the Empire of Japan In 1875, Emperor Mutsuhito Meiji sent an economic mission to resume normal trade between the Empire of Japan and the Philippines. Then, thirteen years after, he ordered to establish a Japanese consulate that would be based in Manila, and Umekichi Yatabe, was the first Japanese consul. According to the Spanish diplomat F.E. Reynoso, in 1894 the Japanese offered to buy the Philippines from Spain for 40 million pounds sterling. However, according to Reynoso this offer was not accepted. According to the scholar C.E. Russell, in 1896 Spain was rumoured to have offered to sell the islands to Japan for $3,000,000 gold dollars, but this offer was rejected. During the 1896 revolution against Spanish colonial rule, some Filipino insurgents (especially the Katipunan) sought assistance from the Japanese government. The Katipunan sought to send a delegate to the Emperor of Japan to solicit funds and military arms in May 1896. The beginning of the uprising coincided with a visit to Manila by the Japanese