the capitulation of the shogunate in 1867, the inhabitants and shogun had to vacate the premises. The castle compound was renamed in October, 1868, and then renamed in 1869. In the year Meiji 2 (1868), on the 23rd day of the 10th month of the Japanese calendar the emperor moved to Tokyo and Edo castle became an imperial palace.

A fire consumed the old Edo Castle on the night of May 5, 1873. The area around the old keep, which burned in the 1657 Meireki fire,