Chapter One: Twilight
tabi ni yande
yume wa kareno o
kakemeguru
Ill on a journey
All about the dreary fields
Fly my broken dreams
- Basho
tabi ni yande
yume wa kareno o
kakemeguru
Ill on a journey
All about the dreary fields
Fly my broken dreams
- Basho
The Muromachi era of Japan began in the mid-fourteenth century, and with its dawn brought new promise. Old imperial rites were revived, powers diversified through the many lords throughout the land. A few of the Ashikaga shoguns even showed greatness. It was Yoshimitsu who finally reunified the Northern and Southern Imperial Courts, ending countless years of division and strife. And it was he who built the golden temple on the western edge of Kyoto. Zen Buddhism and Shinto thrived side by side, and art and culture mingled amongst the imperial courtiers and shogunal samurai. In 1336, it had looked like a promise with foundation.
By 1453, the teenage Ashikaga Yoshimasa was left to reflect upon generation upon generation of what might have been. With the great maelstrom of chaos and anarchy still hovering just beyond the horizon, he mused over the plans for his Ginkakuji, the silver temple he had planned for Kyoto’s eastern hills. His new kanrei (shogunal deputy) had come up with the plan to give the young man’s reign an air of pomp. Historians have long argued whether Yoshimasa had any power to avert the coming disaster, while nationalists have argued that perhaps it was best that Japan was ripped asunder, like the bonsai which only properly grows after brutal pruning. At any rate, when the architectural plans were put forth that summer for the pavilion and garden, none could have predicted the crisis to come, least of all the young Ashikaga walking in the aged shoes of the Muromachi.
The kanrei, Ise Sadachika, was a courtier of the great Asian tradition, a mandarin more adept at bureaucratic intrigue than genuine administration. He was also the shogun’s father-in-law, and held great sway, both privately and at court. The mid-fifteenth century became noteworthy, as much as anything, for Kyoto’s insularity. When famine gripped the eastern Kanto Plain in December of 1458, the kanrei cautioned patience. It was, after all, no concern of the shogun what happened to distant farmers.
The great question of the day was that of succession. Yoshimasa was heirless throughout the early years of his reign, and many called for his brother, Yoshimi, to be named successor. This was eventually done, only to be followed by the then calamitous birth of an heir. To the traditionalists, the son was the natural and rightful heir. To the strong-willed, Yoshimi was the logical choice. Too many of the later Muromachi years had been wasted on infantile shoguns. If Japan was to be strong, she needed a strong sovereign. Or so the thinking went.
The two great shugo clans of the day were the Yamana and Hosokawa, loyal retainers who propped up both emperor and shogun through troubled times. The succession crises brought them into direct conflict. When a succession dispute rose in their own ranks, the time to settle old scores seemed ripe. Ise Sadachika had long resented the great mercantile strength of the Hosokawa, and convinced his son-in-law to side with the less wealthy Yamana. It was time to break the power of Settsu.
The war was brief. The imperial general, Sogo Sojun, marched his army from Yamashiro into Settsu, and laid siege to Naniwa. The Hosokawa had wealth, but had done little to prepare for what had seemed at first a diplomatic row. Naniwa fell in a matter of weeks, and Settsu was made a mercantile enclave, a vassal to the greater Ashikaga bakufu. It was an attempt to impose restrictions on the powerful Hosokawa clan. Instead, it created a microcosm in which their merchants could operate, sending a fraction of the former tribute on to Kyoto. Naniwa grew fat and wealthy, while Japan tightened its purse-strings.
The solution came a year later, when Shiba Daisuke, a lord from one of the Regent Houses, suggested creating a new mercantile centre. Anti-Hosokawan sentiment had reached strange and monstrous proportions by now, and the merchants of Japan, always seen as only a step above the untouchable eta, were now loathed. The decision was made to place them on the seemingly remote outcrop of Satsuma, the southernmost area of Kyushu. There the Shimazu clan ruled, a people with a decidedly more worldly outlook than their Honshu brethren. In time, the outer fringes of Japan came to conduct their trade there, while the more traditional Kansai continued to focus their wealth in Naniwa.
Perhaps sensing weakness from the Japanese throne, perhaps merely to capitalise on their successes throughout Asia, Korea declared war in October 1465. In spite of the many crises unfolding at home, the Japanese navy was up to the job of keeping the seas clear of Korean ships. In April 1466, a decisive battle was fought in the Amakusa Sea, and two Korean warships were captured. These were designed for transport. For whatever reason, Korea had not committed her famous turtle ships to the battle.
The following November saw the western shores of Shikoku invaded by a Korean Army 3,000 strong. Sogo Sojun crossed the straits from Settsu, and within months the offensive was over, the first invasion of Japan from the Asian mainland since Mongol invasions had been devastated by the kamikaze winds of the late thirteenth century.
But the moments of peace following the campaign were fleeting. While a settlement was argued, war broke out within Kyoto proper. The Yamana and Hosokawa took their long rivalry, and their contradictory views over the succession, to the streets of the capital. The result was a bloodbath.
The shogun, in a remarkable act of self-determination, declared both clans to be rebels. The replies were swift. Diplomacy would continue, not on the basis of lord and liege, but on the basis of distinct powers. The shugo were now the daimyos, the ‘great names’. And they would make their presence felt across the land in the ensuing decades.
Within months, other daimyos within the central Kansai region of Honshu had made similar proclamations, some loudly, some with wordless action. The Mori clan simply attacked the Yamana. It was months of bloodshed before a white peace was signed.
Meanwhile, Yoshimasa still had the Koreans to contend with. Indecisive naval skirmishes continued apace, while Sogo dashed his armies up and down the country, staving off various rebellions, many of which were led by the ikko-ikki, a conglomeration of lordless samurai, sohei (warrior monks) and angry farmers.
By November of 1469, Kyoto and its environs were cleared of rebellions. The daimyos generally seemed to be living peaceably, if not harmoniously. Two months later, Korea was attacked by the Jurchen Mongols of Manchu, and hastily agreed to peace with the Ashikaga. Daimyo further in the hinterlands continued to exercise greater independence, but there was an air of calm. With hindsight, this was merely the eye of the storm. The full fury was about to unleash itself.
In the spring, the Amago clan attacked the Yamana, and claimed a devastating victory. The once-proud clan was utterly destroyed. The daimyo committed seppuku , and his retainers obeyed the ancient practice of junshi, ‘following in death’. The Yamana, who only years before had sat at the right hand of the greatest power in the land, were no more. Amago Kiyosada now sat at the head of his conquering armies, with Yamashiro and Kyoto within easy reach. Perhaps he understood that it was too soon for a great unifying victory. Or perhaps, like Hannibal, he simply lacked follow-through. At any rate, he turned from the east, and sought to consolidate power against his local rivals, the Ouchi and Mori.
Ashikaga Yoshimasa died in November of 1471. His son, just ten years old, became shogun, yet another child to claim that title. Like his father, his rule was largely governed by his grandfather, Ise Sadachika. Unlike his father, his rule would shrink to a whisper, and vanish, within his brief lifetime.
In January 1475, the second daimyo aggrandisement occurred in Shikoku. The Chosokabe were destroyed by the forces of Miyoshi Nobuyasu. The Miyoshi now controlled the whole of Shikoku. Months later, the Shimazu followed in independence, cutting off the merchant wealth of Kagoshima. Now, only the Kanto plain retained any semblance of loyalty to the shogun, and to Kyoto.
The Sengoku jidai, the Age of Warring States, had begun.