A History of Japan: From Stone Age to Superpower (25 page)

BOOK: A History of Japan: From Stone Age to Superpower
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From his deathbed Hideyoshi implored the Five Great Elders to look after his infant heir Hideyori (1593–1615), and they promised to do so. However, upon his death the promise was not kept by Ieyasu and a dispute arose over who was to be Hideyoshi’s successor. Ieyasu prevailed. In the Battle of Sekigahara (near Nagoya) in October 1600 he triumphed over those who fought in the cause of Hideyori.

Was this to be the final civil war? Was the national unity so hard won by Nobunaga and Hideyoshi now to be lost, or would Ieyasu be able to maintain control and stability? Time would tell.

Review of Part Two

 

Part Two has, over a period of almost a thousand years, followed the fortunes of the court on the one hand and warriors on the other. The centralised, Chinese-style
ritsury
state was at its strongest during the first half of the Nara period, but signs of decay were evident from an early stage. During the succeeding Heian period, despite court culture and artistic accomplishment reaching a peak, central power continued to decline, as did the importance of things Chinese as they were gradually ‘Japanised’. Factors in this decline of central power included constant intrigues (mostly involving the Fujiwara family), loss of revenue caused by dwindling tax returns from increasingly privately owned land, and loss of personal power by the emperor as a result of regencies and ‘cloister government’ by retired emperors.

By contrast, the power of provincial warriors steadily increased. After clashes between the two most powerful warrior families in the land, the Taira and the Minamoto, in the late twelfth century Minamoto (no) Yoritomo emerged as the effective supreme power in the land – though he still felt a need for formal legitimisation from the court. He established the sh
gunate, or military government, and ushered in the feudal age. However, the sh
gunate too, like the court before it, was soon to be weakened by intrigues and regencies. After surviving threatened invasions and attempts at the restoration of imperial power the sh
gunate eventually lapsed, in many ways not unlike the imperial institution, into a condition of largely nominal meaning only. Powerful warlords vied with each other to establish dominance, and the country was in an almost constant state of civil warfare.

Somewhat ironically, it was during this age of the warrior that some of Japan’s most noted cultural elements and practices, such as
n
drama, austere aesthetics, and Zen Buddhism, became established. Agricultural productivity increased, certainly relative to the inefficiency of the Heian period, though the life of the peasant seems to have made little advance.

Eventually, partly benefiting from firearms introduced by Europeans in the middle of the sixteenth century, one particularly determined war-lord, Oda Nobunaga, was able to establish dominance. He started a process of national unification which was to be carried on by his immediate successors Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu.

The key developments, greatly simplified, are summarised in
Table 2.1
.

Values and practices that continue to have relevance today are summarised in
Table 2.2
.

The behaviour of the typical medieval samurai, the degree of self-interest, and the weakness of family bonding all run counter to modern perceptions. These modern perceptions were to result in large part from later idealisation and propaganda.

Table 2.1
   Key developments in early/medieval Japan

Development

   

Century

Chinese-style
ritsury
state at its peak

  

eighth

Central state gradually loses its revenue, lands, and power, as provincial warriors increase theirs

  

ninth onwards

Court ‘high culture’ at its peak

  

tenth–eleventh

Provincial warriors take over real government, Minamoto no Yoritomo becomes sh
gun

  

late twelfth

Japan survives Mongol attacks

  

mid–late thirteenth

Sh
gunate loses support, civil disorder follows

  

mid–late thirteenth on

Constant civil war

  

mid-fifteenth–late sixteenth

Europeans arrive

  

mid-sixteenth

Country eventually reunified under the warlords Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi

  

late sixteenth

Tokugawa Ieyasu becomes main power in the land

  

end sixteenth

Table 2.2
   Key values and practices in early/medieval Japan


distinction between formal authority and actual power(the latter often separated but legitimised)


preference for the indirect


dominance of pragmatism over principle


diffusion of responsibility (both in terms of conscience being displaced by fatalism, and of the punishment of the collective for the acts of an individual member)


‘Japanisation’ of imported ideas and practices


intermingling of old and new


personalisation of relationships, though more as an expression of dislike of the abstract contract than as genuine respect for the family (at least among warriors).


ideals of austerity and discipline among warriors (though not always in practice)


self-interest rather than loyalty

BOOK: A History of Japan: From Stone Age to Superpower
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