Sengoku Jidai Manual

History of Sengoku Jidai

     A Shogun is more than just a feudal Japanese Darth Vader. The concept of “Seii Tai Shogun” (which means Barbarian subduing generalissimo) is not unique to feudal Japan. It is very similar to the position of Dictator, as used and applied in ancient Rome. In times of severe crisis (the Celtic Invasions of 108 BC and the Spartacus or Serville War 30 years later), Roman consuls were awarded the title of Dictator and the special powers that went along with it . The “shogun” title was created by the Nara family emperors in the Eighth Century AD to meet a similar need. Beset by barbarian tribes from northeastern Japan, the empire needed a supreme military authority who could raise and lead the contentious feudal lords first to defend the empire and then to conquer the barbarians. There were a series of shoguns from 710 until 794 AD. Like the Roman Dictator, the title of Shogun was conveyed for a brief period of time. It was not meant to be a permanent position.

     Japan is a barren, rugged country. Less than one-sixth of the land is arable. Fortunately, the climate is ideal for the planting of rice, which was introduced from China about 300 AD. By the 10th century rice was more than just food, it was a measure of wealth, and that wealth bought power. The largest of the landowners were called daimyos, a title conferred on a noble who owned land that could produce at least 10,000 koku of rice (1.8 million litres) annually.

     The daimyos hired professional warriors to guard their land. These warriors became the samurai. The samurai were required to be proficient in swordsmanship, archery and horseback riding. In return, like feudal European knights, the leading samurai were granted substantial, self-supporting estates. Their homes were protected by moats and walls of bamboo or wood (although the great samurai were able to build with stone).

     Those samurai unable to find permanent employment as retainers with a daimyo became mercenaries; they were known as Ronin. The warriors, samurai and ronin alike, lived by a martial code of honor known as Bushido. They were, however, not the only warriors in the country.

     As in feudal Europe, peasant levies supplied a lot of the manpower for the great armies. Most were armed with spears, although many were later upgraded to arquebusiers after the introduction of firearms by European traders in the 1500s. Many Buddhist monks of the period were excellent soldiers, their martial orders were similar to the Knights Templar, Teutonic Knights and Knights of St. John (Hospitalers) of feudal Europe. Finally there were the Ninjas, a class of special forces warriors not unlike the Assassins’ Guild of Medieval Islam (the fabled Hasish-een).

The Emperor

     The emperor, a savvy man, feared that if he did not chose a shogun to maintain order the daimyos (nobles) would fall to fighting among themselves until one became dominant. The emperor realized that Yoritomo was the most powerful warlord in Japan, and that he would eventually defeat all rivals. Fearful that the ambitious Yoritomo might go one step beyond what his cousin did and usurp the throne, the emperor moved first. He decided it would be better to choose a shogun who would maintain the rights and lineage of the imperial family rather than risk being deposed. In 1192 the emperor officially conferred the title of Shogun on Minamoto Yoritomo and his descendants. Instead of a temporary post as a commander-in-chief to defend the empire, the Shogun was now a hereditary position established to defend the emperor.

     Although the Emperor is the logical apex of this structure, most of his time was spent ensconced away from the lower classes who were not allowed to lay eyes upon him. In fact, the emperor-figurehead was thrilled by any opportunity to leave the Palace and be moved through the streets of Heian-Kyo (Kyoto). Ordinarily, his time was spent 'observing' and was never allowed to actually do anything. Therefore, many Emperors ultimately become Monks, because it allowed them more personal freedom. The position of 'Emperor of Japan' is truly a historical cipher. Imperial power soon came to be destabilized, which heralded the rise of 'classic' Japanese feudalism. As the so-called 'Omnipotent Non-Competent', it soon comes to pass that his authority is delegated to Regents (Sessho) and the Shogun (Japan's top military oligarch).

     It could be said that the Emperor is typically controlled by the previous Emperor, who historically had been controlled by the Fujiwara family. The Fujiwara continually married into the Imperial line to retain sway as aristocrats, and rushed headlong into the political fracas that was the court microcosm.

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Minamoto Yoritomo

     Although the emperor gave up much of his power to the Shogun, he secured the dynasty’s future and established a new order that in many ways still survives to this day. The emperor rose, like the son of heaven, above all earthly affairs. Absolved of all responsibility for the day-to-day affairs of government, the emperor became a unifying, religious symbol. The Shogun would have great temporal power, but would remain a servant and protector of the emperor and the imperial family. It was a masterstroke of political genius that guaranteed the survival of the imperial system; it is a key reason why, even after the depredations of World War II, there is still an emperor of Japan today.

     Part of Yoritomo’s deal with the emperor was to remove the Shogun’s headquarters (and his samurai warriors) from the imperial city of Kyoto to a military camp at Kamakura. The Shogun was freed from court interference and the court was secure from the posturing depredations of the warrior class. From his command tent (called a bakufu) at Kamakura, Yoritomo appointed provincial officials, dispatched armies to crush unrest and promulgated laws to govern national affairs. This “tent government” lasted until his death in 1199. The title and responsibilities were passed down to his descendants until the last of them died in 1219, at which time the title passed to Yoritomo’s relatives in the Hojo family. (The Hojo, ironically, were descended from the Minamoto’s arch-rivals, the Taira).

The Ashikaga Shogunate

     In 1338 the Ashikaga family, who were also descended from the Minamotos, seized the shogunate from the Hojos in a bloody civil war. The Ashikagas, however, were unable to restore the strong central government of the previous shoguns, and remained in power only by playing off rival daimyos (regional barons) against one another. A series of local and regional wars culminated in the devastating Onin War of 1467-1477. Instead of controlling the daimyos, the Ashikagas became their puppets. This encouraged daimyos to accrue more power, raise armies and fight one another. Their rivalry was so continuous that the entire 16th Century is known as the Age of the Country at War (Senoku Jidai).

Nobunaga Ascendant

     In the last third of the 16th Century a particularly powerful and brilliant military daimyo, Oda Nobunaga, became the “shogun-maker.” (He was similar to Lord Stanley, the “king-maker” of the English 15th Century War of the Roses). Nobunaga finally tired of the shadowplay of weak shoguns and deposed the last of the Ashikagas (whom he himself had made shogun) in 1573. That deposition launched the last and most devastating of the great civil wars of Japan’s feudal era.

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Oda Nobunaga

     After Nobunaga deposed Yashiaki, the last of the Ashikaga shoguns, he and his lieutenants, Tokugawa Ieyasu and Toyotomi Hideyoshi, began the unification of Japan. They set upon a campaign of annihilating minor daimyos and of building castles to secure their rule. One of their chief enemies was the Mori Clan, whom Hideyoshi ruthlessly wiped out in a series of campaigns in western Japan.

     In 1570 the Takeda's lands now included Kai, Shinano, Suruga, and pieces of Kozuke, Totomi, and Hida. Takeda Shingen, at 49, was something more than a regional power - he was the most important warlord east of Mino, and the one who was in a position to derail Oda Nobunaga's march to national hegemony. Shingen alone possessed the strategic position, the generalship, and the solid retainer band necessary.

     Takeda and Oda, after an abortive diplomatic courtship designed to check the Uesugi, initiated a war of words, possibly with the shogun, Ashikaga Yoshiaki, at the center of the storm. There did, however, exist a limited agreed peace between the Nobunaga and Shingen.

     Nobunaga fought his greatest battle against the Kanto family, known for their reliance on heavy, armored cavalry. Nobunaga, on the other hand, owed much of his power to the effective use of firearms. In 1575 his infantry, wearing waterproof straw jackets and carrying matchlock firearms, stood firm behind a barrier fence and cut down wave after wave of Kanto lancers. It was the Agincourt of Japan; Nobunaga’s victory changed the face of war in Japan.

Burning Monks, Guns for Girls and The Monkey

     The Portuguese traders introduced the arquebus (a comparatively crude matchlock and forerunner of the musket) to Japan in 1542. Within a year a Portuguese gunner traded away the secret of gun-making in return for the hand in marriage of the daughter of a master sword-smith in the port of Tanega-shima. The smiths of Tanega-shima began making their own, lighter versions of the arquebus in 1543. By 1560 firearms were being manufactured throughout the country. It was Nobunaga, however, who forged a powerful tactical weapon from a mix of elite samurai and peasant spearmen and arquebusiers. His lieutenant, Ieyasu, would later improve upon that mix to forge an even more modern army.

     It was Ieyasu who helped Nobunaga destroy the power of the Buddhist military orders. In 1582 they attacked and destroyed the great monastery at Osaka. The warrior monks died in its flames. Nobunaga then divided his forces. He sent Ieyasu into the eastern portion of Japan and ordered Hideyoshi to go toward the western half of the country. With his main armies on the march, Nobunaga moved to the security of Kyoto. There the local army of General Akechi Mitsuhibi, revolted. Surprised and surrounded and with only a handful of personal retainers, Nobunaga met his doom. Whether he died at his own hands, rather than suffer the indignity of surrender, or was murdered by assassins remains a mystery.

Hideyoshi, The Monkey General

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Hideyoshi

     Hideyoshi, who was nearest to Kyoto, rushed back to take control of the capital. He killed all of the rebels (most of whom were rumored to have been in his pay). Hideyoshi recalled Ieyasu and together they defeated the Oda family, their last great obstacle to power.

     In 1585 Hideyoshi declared himself the “Kanpaku,” (Imperial Regent). Of humble origin, Hideyoshi could not aspire to claim the title of shogun, but with the authority of the Kanpaku he set about forcing those of noble birth to take an oath of loyalty to him.

     Ieyasu, a handsome young warrior of noble family, often quarreled with Hideyoshi, a withered, crafty figure of dubious parentage and conjectural progeny. Hideyoshi, however, was a crafty survivor. He had risen from a common bandit to become a samurai, a daimyo and one of the most powerful men in Japan. Despite his status, however, Hideyoshi was still referred to by many by the nickname Nobunaga had bestowed upon him because of his hunched, animalistic appearance: Monkey.

     Hideyoshi tried to bury that nickname, and his common origin, in gold. He moved from Kyoto to Osaka and built a great stone castle. Several dozen towers, higher than any before built in Japan, loomed over a huge fortress with walls made from 30 foot square stone blocks. A moat 300 feet wide surrounded the castle. In the center stood a great white-washed stone keep, eight stories tall. The castle was lavishly appointed. Several walls of the keep were covered with gold, while the rest of his quarters sparkled with jewels and gilt. He hired the acknowledged master of the elegant tea-ceremony, Sen Rikyu, as his tutor. The Monkey, however, remained classless and base. To his tutor’s dismay he built a portable tea house --and then ordered it plated with gold.

     Hideyoshi commissioned a land census, not unlike the Domesday Book of England’s William the Conqueror. The information gained from that process allowed him to establish a uniform system of taxation. He granted lands based on this survey to his most trusted and loyal officers. To one of them, Ieyasu, he gave the governorship of the Kanto provinces, and their capital, Edo.

     Ieyasu and other lords were entrusted with the “Sword Hunt,” a decree requiring all people except samurai to turn over all weapons to their lords. Hideyoshi placated the last of the warrior monks and the armed peasantry by promising to melt down all of the confiscated arms and pour that molten liquid into a giant mold of a Buddha.

The Tokugawa Heirs

Ieyasu’s grandson, Iemitsu, who came to power in 1623, decreed that daimyos spend every second year in Edo. The Tokugawa made certain that every daimyo knew he held his land in fief from the Tokugawa, and that the Shogun could confiscate all or part of that land at any time. By the end of the 17th Century, the Tokugawa family held over one-fourth of all land in Japan as well as almost all of the silver mines.

     The Tokugawa removed the samurai warriors from the political picture by segregating them in special samurai or “castle” towns. The masterless or mercenary samurai that had formed the backbone of so many daimyo revolts, the Ronin, were left unemployed by the peace. Most were forced by economic necessity to become merchants, artisans or monks. The last of the Ronin were destroyed in 1703, when after a revolt the last 47 such warriors were forced to commit ritual suicide when their employer became dishonored.

     Instead of a warrior class, the Tokugawa set up a bureaucracy to govern the country. They built roads, standardized the currency and laws and established a rigid class system of merchants, farmers, artisans and, finally, samurai, from which the nobility and bureaucrats were drawn. Samurai titles were limited to six generations of descendants. Many chose to go into the arts, education or trade rather than remain impoverished retainers of the daimyos, who had little need of and even less use for armed followers.

     While the Tokugawa ran the country, the imperial family lived in splendor in Kyoto. The Tokugawa reign gave rise to a lengthy period of peace and prosperity that few other countries have enjoyed. Unfortunately, that led to a complacent rigidity and conservatism that caused Japan to isolate herself from the rest of the world. When the world, in the figure of American Naval officer Commodore Matthew Perry, shattered that complacency in 1853, the Shogunate lacked the flexibility to deal with change. Unrest brought about by change led to the collapse of the Shogunate and the transformation of Japan into a modern power.

Sources

The Wargamer Presents: Warfare in Feudal Japan

Takeda History