Early Japanese History
What's it all about?...
By Cory Riemer Published on March 13, 2014 at 1:36 PM
In early Japanese history a civil war shattered Japan’s feudal system in 1467. Power drained away from the shogun to territorial lords in hundreds of separate domains. This time in Japanese history, which lasted from 1427 to 1568, is known as the Sengoku, or “Warring States,” period. They offered peasants and others protection in return for their loyalty. Under this system, security came from this group of powerful warlords. The new Japanese feudalism resembled European in many ways. Later they added foot soldiers with muskets to their ranks. This led to endless disorder throughout the land.
One of them, the brutal and ambitious Oda Nobunaga, defeated his rivals and seized the imperial capital Kyoto in 1568. These included rival daimyo as well as wealthy Buddhist monasteries aligned with them. This was the 3,000 musketeers crushed an enemy force of samurai cavalry. However, Nobunaga's was not able to unify Japan. Hideyoshi set out to destroy the daimyos that remained hostile. When Hideyoshi died in 1598, his troops withdrew from Korea. Japan was unified, but the daimyo still governed at the local level. Even when they returned to their lands, they had to leave their families behind as hostages in Edo. In Japan, as in China, Confucian values influenced ideas about society. Farmers, not merchants, made ideal citizens. Many of them abandoned farm life and headed for the expanding towns and cities. By the mid 1700s, Japan began to shift to urban from rural society. The rise of large commercial centers increased employment opportunities for women. |
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Information Retrieved from: Beck, Roger, Linda Black, Larry Krieger, Phillip Naylor, and Dahia Ibo Shabaka. World History: Patterns of Interaction. 1st ed. Evanston, Boston, Dallas: McDougal Littell, 2003. Print.