Inoue Masashige

Inoue Masashige (井上 政重, 1585 – 27 March 1661) was an important figure during the early Edo period in Japan. He played a role in the persecution and eradication of Christians in Japan and he was commissioner for the Dutch East India Company in Nagasaki.

He is thought to have risen to prominence. In his post of Grand Councillor (ōmetsuke), Masashige had many encounters with the Dutch East India Company, who recorded much about him. One of the Company's employees, Olof Eriksson Willman, a Swede, recorded that Masashige tried to sleep with him, though Willman asserts he rebuffed him.