The castle towns in the domains in Japan started to get bigger because of the arrival of large numbers of merchants and artisans.

In each domain there was a castle built by the daimyo were he lived, around this castle lived the samurai and in the surrounding area were the farmers, artisans, and merchants with their families.

The workers and their faimlies started to move towards the castle to meet the needs of both the samurai and the daimyo.

The samurai and daimyo were provided with conveniences like goods services which made the economy of the castle towns to grow.

As the castle towns continued to rapidly enlarge during the Edo period, Kyoto, Osaka, & Edo each grew up to more than 1 million citizens.

Other cities grew too and as people started moving more to urban areas, the Japanese society started to change. Although people still regarded rural life as very highly.

Changing from a rural to an urban society later helped Japan in the transition it would have when the Meiji Period arrives.