A HISTORY OF JAPAN FROM CREATION TO THE PRESENT DAY

On the face of it, Japanese culture is absurd. An early Jesuit missionary decided that the Japanese "have rites and ceremonies so different from those of all other nations that it seems they deliberately try to be unlike any other people." Four hundred years later the Japanese economy dominates the world and our homes are full of Japanese products; and yet we have little more idea about the workings of our capitalist comrades than the 16th Century Jesuits did.
We admire and value Japanese art and craft without nearly appreciating the culture that produced it; just as we do with native art from other parts of the world. We are enormously impressed with the vibrancy of the Japanese economy but have absolutely no idea how to emulate it. Deep down, perhaps we reckon that we couldn't possibly work that hard. Maybe we wouldn't want to. While we have always been told that worker and capitalist are inevitably in conflict, the Japanese worker has a fierce commitment to his job, his factory and his employer. It just doesn't seem fair, really.
Japanese culture is mesmerizing largely because it isimpossible to understand. We can't help feeling that
someone has missed the point somewhere, but we are not quite sure whether it is them or us. How many times have we sat in front of a television documentary on Japan, or Sumo wrestling, or one of those extraordinary sadistic game shows and gone to bed a hour later none the wiser about anything? Could anyone look less like an athlete and sex symbol than a Sumo wrestler? And why do they wear that enormous leather jockstrap and walk up and down cocking their legs and throwing salt? Even when its explained, we don't understand.
Our grasp on Japanese culture is so loose that understand it mostly as a handful of clichÇs. Why on earth do they have to train for ten years before they can make tea? Why are their walls made out of paper? Why do they regard ritually sticking a sword into their stomach a great privilege? Who thought up the notion of employing men in white gloves to push commuters onto trains and why did everyone else think it was a good idea? Why do they enjoy Karaoke machines so much? Why do they keep gravel pits raked for thousands of years to look like the waves of the sea? It's all very impressive, but why do it at all? It's absurd. Nevertheless, when we look at someone and think that they are absurd, we are usually looking at a mirror. Someone who seems ridiculous is often just someone we don't understand. That Jesuit missionary was trying just as hard to be different as the Japanese were. We each view the world and the other people in it through the filter of our own culture; and we are quick to spot the absurdities in others. If we think the Japanese are odd, what must they think of us? A Kalahari bushman probably thinks that we are both ridiculous. In the end, who's to say who's right?

THE SOURCES OF JAPANESE CULTURE

The Island Fortress
Japanese culture developed very largely in isolation from the rest of the world, contributing in no small measure to its unfathomable depths. Japan is much more of an island fortress than Britain, another island of similar size which has at one time in its history dominated the world.
Indeed, Japan has never been invaded by sea. Kublai Khan
tried a couple of times in the thirteenth century but wasbeaten back by the weather and in particular by a typhoon
which has become known as 'The Wind of the Gods', or 'Kamikaze'. The only time that Japan has been ruled by a foreign power was 1945-52 by the Allies, an 'invasion' brought about by dropping the atom bombs and forcing a surrender. Moreover, before the current century Japan had only invaded a neighbor on one occasion, when the warlord Hideyoshi spent a couple of years at the end of the 16th Century trying to invade Ming China through Korea.

The Cultural Sponge
On the other hand, Japanese culture has borrowed extensively from China and Korea in the seventh, eighth and ninth centuries and then from the European and American culture during the last hundred years. In both cases, it then adjusted what it had absorbed into something uniquely Japanese. This of course only adds to the outside world's confusion as something familiar is 'distorted' into something alien. It is probably fair to say that Japanese culture has been formed by absorption and adaptation rather than by creation or invention. There are no great intellectual or religious figures in Japanese history and very few political innovators.
Nevertheless, it would be wrong to imply that the Japanese have simply swung behind the prevailing wind. They have a very strong national identity and have always decided for themselves what it is they want to absorb. Buddhism and Confucianism were both happily imported, but Christianity was excluded and persecuted because it was seen as a threat to Japanese identity. Furthermore, on two separate occasions Japan cut herself off from outside influence for two hundred years or more. Thus, despite appearances to the contrary, Japanese culture is very definitely not simply a mixture of Chinese and American cultures.

The Japanese Identity
There is much that is uniquely Japanese and which therefore has a strong unifying effect. This is perhaps an odd claim when one considers that most of Japanese history is a story of civil war and the ebb and flow of a medieval feudal
society. Successively unified and divided again over thecenturies, in relation to the outside world there has been
little doubt who and what constitute Japan. Of course, part of this is derived from being an island (or cluster of islands). However, while Britain, for example, contains a Welsh and a Scottish border and is still fighting a war over Ireland, Japanese civil wars have always been more about which particular warlord could dominate the others rather than about sub-national identity.
In addition however, Japan effectively has a unique and uniform language, race and religion. Although there are a few local dialects, Japanese is spoken all over Japan and nowhere else in the world (except in a few multinational board rooms). It is also very difficult to learn. Indeed, the Basque Jesuit, Francis Xavier considered the Japanese language to be an instrument of the devil devised to hinder his missionary activities. Moreover, the Shinto religion is only practiced in Japan and is not an evangelizing faith. Apart from a few small sects, there are no religious minorities and such religious wars as there have been were over temporal power rather than spiritual belief. There is no ethnic minority problem simply because the only ethnic groups are too small to be a problem. The only two significant ones are the Ainu and the migrant Koreans, the latter of which in particular are kept firmly as second class citizens. The Ainu were the original occupants of Japan, a Caucasoid race who were pushed into the far north by the migrations of the Mongoloid modern Japanese about 10,000 years ago. Bigger, fairer and more hairy than the Japanese, the Ainu are regarded as a beautiful race; especially the women, who are in great demand as models in modern Japan. Nevertheless, the Ainu were defeated long ago and only a few thousand remain in the villages of the northern island of Hokkaido.

Capitalism out of Feudalism
Japanese history before the mid-nineteenth century is very largely a seamless garment. Feudal lords jostled for power and influence over each other; sometimes peaceably, sometimes not. On occasion, one particular lord and his family would gain control over most if not all of the territory of Japan and a degree of centralization took place while his dynasty remained strong. That period wouldprobably come to be known by the family name or the capital
from which it ruled. When the dynasty weakened, it was toppled and a period of chaos and local rule would follow until another warlord could dominate. There were no great revolutions, no conquests, no far reaching social reforms, no political or institutional development.
The fact that the last great dynasty to centralize Japan, the Tokugawa, provided the spring board from which modern Japan leapt into being does not in itself mean that it was so very different from the rest. Because the last hundred years of Japanese history is so extraordinary, a large number of the history books are really trying to explain how modern Japan came out of the Tokugawa rule. It is nevertheless not inconceivable that the country could once again have splintered into local feudal factions. In fact, the problem that the historians have is that, if history is anything to go by, it was far more likely that Japan would have decentralized than have developed as quickly as it did into greatest capitalist power in the world.

LEGEND AND THE IMPERIAL HOUSE

A Mythical Beginning
One of the many ironies of Japanese history is that the enormously long feudal period was at least partially caused by the absence of a powerful monarchy against which to evolve, while at the same time Japan can claim to have the longest surviving monarchical dynasty in the world. Indeed, if Shinto legend is believed, the present Emperor of Japan can trace his lineage back to the twin gods who created the world. In the beginning, the world was divided into a pure upper Heaven and an impure lower Earth. The god Izanagi and the goddess Izanimi stood on the bridge between the two. Izanagi bent down and stirred up the formless Earth with a spear thereby creating the islands of Japan, which are thus called 'Shinkoku', or 'The Land of the Gods'.
In the fullness of time, Izanimi died and began to rot away in the land of the dead. Rather tactlessly, Izanagi followed her and she was so upset that he had seen her in her semi-decayed state that she divorced him. In disgust, Izanagi washed himself in the sea and out of his right eye came the Moon goddess, out of his left eye the Sun goddess
Amaterasu and (rather appropriately) out of his nose camethe storm god, Susanoo. Amaterasu, also known as 'the Great
Sky Shiner', got upset because Susanoo had destroyed her rice fields and sulked in the cave of heaven until she was enticed out by some of the other gods. Thus day and night were created.
One of the more important contributions that Amaterasu made to Japanese history was that she sent her grandson, Ninigi-No-Mikoto, to rule Japan and his grandson, Jinmu, became the first Emperor. Thus, since the Emperor was born from the very apex of the Shinto pantheon, he was divine himself and could therefore act as an intermediary between men and the gods. In time of drought, he could bring rain; in time of war, he could bring victory. In legend, Jinmu came to the throne on February 11th, 660 BC but a date in the second or third century is more likely.

An Historical Root
Before the fourth century, Japan had been a collection of relatively diffuse and independent states held together by alliances between the ruling families. The imperial family was the first to gain overall control of the country sometime during that century. However, over the years the emperor lost his political power and was reduced to a kind of high priest, above mundane temporal matters. Moreover, although there have been ten female emperors, it is very much a male institution. Of the ten, eight were concentrated in the seventh and eighth centuries and the remaining two neither married nor bore children.
During the seventh and eighth centuries Japan was greatly influenced by the Chinese T'ang dynasty (618-907) and the Japanese imperial institution made something of a come-back on the political scene. Since the Chinese Emperor was both divine and the ruler of his country, the mid seventh to the early ninth century saw the greatest time of temporal power for the Japanese emperor. It is all too easy for Europeans to forget quite how powerful and culturally splendid the Chinese Empire was. At the time of Christ, the Han Empire rivaled Rome in size and power. In the seventh century, the T'ang ruled an enormous territory that stretched as far as Persia. They even won battles against the Turks. From the tenth century however, the Sung were more inward looking and thus had less of an impact on their neighbors. Under the influence of the T'ang, the Japanese imperial dynasty commissioned two great family histories, called the 'Kojiki' (The Record of Old Things) and the 'Nihon-Shoki' (The Chronicle of Japan). By putting down in writing exactly how it was the emperor was related to the gods, they legitimized his position of authority. Furthermore, in 701 the 'Taiho Ritsu' (Penal Code) and the 'Taiho Ryo' (Civil Code) were produced. These laid out the laws of the land in great detail and placed the responsibility for their application firmly with the emperor. During this period, called the Ritsu-Ryo, power was centralized on the imperial court in their capital of Kyoto.

A Constitutional Figurehead
That this centralization did not last is typical of the tension between centrifugal and centripetal forces in Japanese history. Once central power is established the forces gather to restore regional control, which is in turn superseded by eventual reunification. Through it all, and by virtue of his divine position, the emperor remains the nominal ruler though he very seldom actually holds power. Strangely enough, there does seem to be a Japanese tendency for power to rest behind a figurehead, usually the emperor. Moreover, it is fairly common for a leader to struggle to gain power only to abdicate fairly quickly in favor of a chosen successor.
This has contributed to the remarkable resilience of not only the imperial institution but the imperial dynasty as well. The Chinese emperor held his mandate to rule partially because of his perceived virtue; thus a Chinese imperial dynasty could be ended if an emperor was rendered unfit to rule by losing his virtue. The Japanese institution, on the other hand, was entirely hereditary. Moreover, any son could inherit and if the emperor was infertile a successor was chosen from the wider family. A plentiful supply of concubines maintained a good choice. Thus secular powers could have a direct and decisive influence on the choice of emperor. In this way, the position and lineage of the emperor could be kept inviolate while secular powers retained control of who sat on the throne. Thus there was no need for secularrulers to threaten the emperor, they simply ignored him.
Indeed, if a secular ruler had replaced the emperor, his influence would probably have diminished very quickly. As a consequence, the legitimacy of the emperor remained extremely strong while his actual power (and at times even his wealth) was negligible. This meant that no other family claimed to be the 'rightful heirs to the throne' (the cause of many a European war) and power simply rested with whomever could prove the strongest.

A Source of Power
That is not to say that warlords did not attempt to establish dynastic rule, they simply did so outside of the imperial institution. In the ninth century Fujiwara Mototsune took control of the country and invented the title of 'kanpaku', or 'chief councilor', with which to rule; a title which could only be held by the Fujiwara family. The Fujiwara then placed lots of their women in the imperial harem with the result that three quarters of the subsequent emperors were born of Fujiwara women. In 1192, Minamoto Yoritomo took power and revived the ancient title of 'shogun', which again became an hereditary title for the Minamoto family.
These titles were then used to legitimate the position of whoever actually held power, especially when that power was seen to be weakening. A lineage was fabricated and the emperor forced to appoint the effective ruler to some prestigious post thereby, of course, adding the new ruler's family to the hereditary pool for future appointments to that title. For example, at the turn of the seventeenth century, the warlord Nobunaga declared himself neither kanpaku nor shogun because he did not have the correct ancestry. His successor, Hideyoshi, fraudulently claimed to be of the Fujiwara family and got the emperor to make him kanpaku. His successor, Ieyasu, claimed Minamoto descent and assumed the title of shogun.
Thus Japan possessed the trappings of a dynastic monarchy
without actually recognizing its authority. Emperors were
simply wheeled out to confer impressive titles on those who
already held power. Nevertheless, it is significant that
the position of the emperor and the respect which he enjoyed
were maintained throughout centuries of humiliation. Whenin the middle of the nineteenth century the emperor himself
made a successful bid to take political control, he had an enormous legitimacy which probably did more than anything to keep the modern Japanese bandwagon on the rails.

JAPANESE RELIGION

Religion in Japan is a relatively straight forward topic despite being made up of a mixture of three distinct faiths. Shinto, Buddhism and Confucianism are all flexible and tolerant and are able to co-exist without any real problem. They are each focused on a different aspect of human existence and, while in a pure form they would disagree on what is important in life, in the hands of the ever-adaptable Japanese they survive in forms which are apparently consistent and even complementary. While Shinto is regarded as the official religion, this has only been so since the nineteenth century when it was used, as much as anything, as the symbol of a unique Japanese identity.

The Divine World
Shinto, meaning 'the Way of the Gods', is a very ancient religion with no great founding figure equivalent to Moses, Jesus or Mohammed. Indeed, it is really a systemized tribal religion in the sense that it consists largely of a series of rituals and beliefs that explain and temper the world around the Japanese and places Japan itself at the center of creation. It was only when Buddhism and Confucianism arrived in the sixth century that it was even given a name in order to distinguish it as the indigenous faith. In this way, a mixture of local and regional cults were organized into a national religion.
Because Shinto has been concentrated for so long within a dynamic and self-contained culture, it has acquired a more sophisticated form than most tribal beliefs. It is regarded as a 'world religion' mainly because there are 35 million adherents, but they are all Japanese and there is no sense in which Shinto is a religion for the rest of the world. In this, it is similar to Hinduism, which means 'belonging to the Indus'. Certainly neither could be described as evangelizing, which is not surprising since it would not make sense for an African, for example, to worship a Japanese mountain and the Japanese emperor. According to Shinto, the gods, man and nature are all part of the 'kami', or life force, of which there is an unlimited number of manifestations. Thus, spirits of fertility and productivity are kami along with natural phenomena such as wind, rain and thunder, natural objects such as mountains and rivers, animals such as dogs and foxes and ancestral spirits. Indeed, since man is as much a kami as anything else, a mirror is often used as a symbol of the divine. Evil and death are both illusions because we are all lost in a pool of divinity anyway. Men simply have to realize and appreciate that life is good, the gods are noble and Japan is beautiful. Their duty is simply to be pure and virtuous.
There is no great creed or requirement to hold specific beliefs, no holy struggle, just a joyful acceptance of what is already all about us. There is no need for salvation or to satisfy certain criteria in order to enter heaven because we are all part of it anyway. On the contrary, the point is to perform ceremonies and rituals in order to bring heaven into this world. These rituals and the object of their performance will vary from place to place and from family to family and are concerned with both community and individual life. In the more ancient folk Shinto there are also rituals designed to placate hostile kami, a fairly typical feature of tribal religion.

The Individual Path
Buddhism arrived in Japan in the sixth century via Korea and is again a tolerant and co-operative faith. Since it does not really address the divine, mainly because God is unknowable, it does not need threaten another religion's divine teaching. In Buddhism, this life is really only an entrance examination to a state of blissful Nirvana which is beyond desire, suffering, life and death. The aim of the Buddhist is therefore to live as pure and disciplined a life as possible so as to maximize the chances of being able to realize Nirvana in this life or the next. This of course ties in very well with Shinto were the aim is again simply to be pure and virtuous. Indeed, since Shinto is strong on the benefits of this life and Buddhism on the rewards in the next, most Japanese families have shrines to both religions in their homes. In 552 the King of Korea gave a huge golden statue of the Buddha to the Japanese emperor as a gift. It was placed in the home of the chief minister, but very soon afterwards there was an outbreak of small pox. It was assumed that the gods of Shinto had been offended by the reverence given to the Buddha and it was dumped into a canal. However, when a bolt of lightening struck the Imperial palace, it appeared that the gods of Buddhism had also been upset. The statue was fished out and placed in its own temple. The two faiths have happily co-existed ever since, each sitting in their own temple.

The Ordered Society
Confucianism is more of a moral philosophy than a religion. Again it does not really concern itself with the divine and its emphasis is much more upon the organization of society than the spiritual condition of the individual. As such it fits quite easily alongside the other two and has had more of an impact on the day to day structures of Japanese political and social organization. Confucius' real name was K'ung-Fu-Tzu, the one being a Europeanized version of the other, and he lived in China from 551 to 479 BC. Although he did not write any books himself, his saying were recorded by his disciples in The Analects. His thinking was later developed by Mencius (Meng-Tzu) who lived from 371 to 289 BC.
Apparently, Confucius himself was tall and slender with a reddish beard and a twinkle in his eye. He was basically a philosopher and an idealist, though with a highly developed sense of the practical. He combined religion, philosophy and law into a series of practical truths that were designed to build towards a more harmonious society. He considered man to be inherently good and therefore saw no reason for there to be suffering, if only things could be organized correctly. He aimed to restore harmony out of the chaos and anarchy that he saw all about him. Conflict could not be constructive and was therefore to be avoided as a first step. Society was to be ordered by a construction of hierarchical relationships that built up from the individual through his family to his sovereign. Everyone was to know and accepthis place within this structure. The harmony of the whole was dependent upon the virtue of the individual, and this included the sovereign. As we have seen, the Chinese emperor could lose his mandate to rule if he ceased being virtuous. Thus the superior in any relationship had a responsibility to virtue, benevolence and the setting of a good example. The inferior party was to know his place and be loyal to his superior. Calamity is caused by society not being harmonious or by a ruler not being virtuous.

The Union
Thus, since these three religions focused on different areas of human existence, they could be incorporated into one whole. Of course, there were differences and as such there were separate temples, philosophers and priesthoods. No doubt, there was great debate between loyal members of particular sects but for the nation as a whole there was no need for religious conflict. In stark contrast, when Christianity came along, it demanded the rejection of other faiths and other loyalties. Purity and virtue were not enough and a specific salvation was required to avoid everlasting torment. Moreover, both its origins and its leadership were located on the other side of the world. It was intolerant and alien and treated by the Japanese as such.

SAMURAI AND SHOGUN

The Emperor
The period from the eighth to the twelfth century is known as the Heian period and marks the second rise and fall of the Imperial house. As has already been said, the early part of this period, under the influence of extensive trading links with the T'ang Chinese, was one of great power for the emperor and his court at Kyoto. After the tenth century, however, the links with China were severed and power drifted away from Kyoto and into the hands of the regional military lords, or 'daimyo'. Allegiance shifted from the emperor to the daimyo and a typical feudal society emerged. The daimyo bolstered their position by employing professional personal armies and there emerged the Japanese equivalent of the European 'knight', the 'samurai'. The second half of the Heian period can be seen in terms of the 'buke', or military families, challenging the 'kuge', or civilian nobility, for control of Japan. The buke were mostly successful and held sway right up until the nineteenth century. Interestingly enough, although power was in the hands of the buke, a good deal of prestige remained with the kuge. The Heian was a flourishing cultural time and the kuge acquired a reputation as paragons of civilization and sophistication. Even as life in Kyoto became increasingly decadent and many of the buke became very learned, the feeling stuck that the crude and rustic buke were doing well if they could secure a kuge girl in marriage.

The Samurai
'Bu' means 'military' or 'arms' so that 'bushi' means 'warrior' and 'bushido' means 'the way of the warrior'. 'Samurai', which is another word for bushi, means 'one who serves', thus a samurai was both a man of arms and a retainer. He followed the bushido and owed total allegiance to his daimyo. Purity and loyalty were qualities that the samurai were esteemed for just as much as their prowess in battle. Thus while the intellectual position of the kuge was admired, the moral code was bushido. Bushido was in fact the product of a martial society and Confucianism, reinforced by the arrival of Zen-Shu Buddhism from China which was a form much more attuned to martial values. Manly virtues were admired and women were relegated to a very subservient role. There were three basic grades of samurai depending on who they served. There were those of the shogun, or dominant daimyo, those of other daimyo and those who had lost their masters for some reason. These latter ones, called 'ronin', roamed the countryside as mercenaries or criminals and were popular characters in plays and stories. Originally, a samurai battle was effectively a series of individual combats. A warrior would announce his pedigree, his motivation for fighting and his intentions if we won and then be challenged to a sword fight. By the fourteenth century, the greater use of horses in battle had led to more coordinated cavalry charges. The samurai was then a mounted archer and, indeed, the way of the samurai was referred to as the way of the horse and bow. By the end of the Heian period, the kuge and the imperial
court were living it up in Kyoto while the buke fought their battles for them. Apart from fighting amongst themselves there were still significant numbers of Ainu to suppress in the north of Honshu. In reward for their service, the buke were given private estates with an income which could then be divided up and parts given to samurai vassals. In this way, land that theoretically belonged to the emperor was actually being divided up between the daimyo and their vassals. Thus, the emperor was losing both his political power and his land.

The Shogun
A number of insurrections, notably the Hogen in 1156 and the Heiji in 1159-60, confirmed that power had moved from the noble courts to the military chiefs. The Genpei wars of 1180-85 between the buke families of Taira and Minamoto proved to be decisive. The Taira were eventually routed at the battle of Dan-No-Ura in 1185, the largest naval battle that the Far East had yet seen. Previously, the epic poetry such as the Genji Monogatari had been about the glories of the Heian court. Now the Heike Monogatari told the story of the rise and fall of the house of Taira on the battle field. Minamoto Yoritomo, based in his capital of Kamakura on the east coast, restored order and in 1192 forced Emperor Go-Toba to appoint him 'Sei-I-Tai-Shogun', 'Commander-in-Chief of suppressing the Barbarians'.
This title actually dated back to a much earlier period when there was a need for the Japanese to conquer more territory from the Ainu in which to live. The Europeans were also later to be regarded as barbarians, a designation inherited from the Chinese. Indeed, even in the nineteenth century when the shogun had become the chief administrator, there were some who felt that he ought to do his duty and expel a few barbarians. In ancient times, the office was an ad hoc arrangement and thus the shogun had set up his headquarters in a tent. Minamoto Yoritomo revived this notion as well and called his rule 'bakufu', or 'tent government'. From then on, even when the shogun ruled from a well fortified and permanent castle, it was called a 'bakufu'.
The establishment of the Minamoto shogunate out of thefeudal soup was a pattern repeated with the Ashikaga dynasty
in 1338 and the Tokugawa in 1603. The shogun was very much a first among equals, with Japan divided into rival fiefs and the secular power of the emperor quietly ignored. In fact, power quickly fell to the Hojo family who created the title of 'shikken' or regent to the shogun, with which to rule. Thus had arisen the extraordinary situation that the theoretical rule of the emperor had been ignored to establish the shogun's power in Kamakura, while power actually resided elsewhere with the shikken. The prestige of the Kamakura bakufu and the Hojo dynasty was seriously undermined by the lucky escape from the attempted Mongol invasions of 1274 and 1281 and both were overthrown in 1333.

The Wako
The next three years are known as the Kenmu Restoration as the kuge and Emperor Go-Daigo sought to re-establish the rule of Kyoto. Their failure and the founding of the Ashikaga shogunate sent the imperial household into serious decline from which it only recovered in the seventeenth century. The Ashikaga shogunate is notable for its control of Japanese pirates, or 'wako'. From the mid fourteenth century, piracy had become a lucrative business the daimyo along the western coast of Japan. They raided all along the coast of China and Korea and throughout South East Asia, eventually invading in force and raiding up the Yangtse. The Chinese and Koreans both sent embassies to the Ashikaga shoguns to try and get the raids stopped. This was finally achieved by Yoshimitsu, who was declared King of Japan by the Ming Emperor Chu Ti, a rather patronizing gesture that was not really welcomed by Yoshimitsu. As the Ashikaga dynasty weakened, piracy returned and the Chinese eventually broke off diplomatic relations. It is interesting to note that at this point, Japan was an expansionist commercial nation with colonies all over the Far East maintained by pirate fleets who were not exactly under the control of the Japanese ruler. In this she was not dissimilar to Elizabethan England. By the second half of the fifteenth century, the Ashikaga shogunate was in trouble. During the Onin Civil Wars of 1467-77, the central power of the shogun ceased to exist and the feudal system all but collapsed. The last Ashikagashogun, Yoshimasa, like the Roman Emperor Nero, fiddled while Japan burned, sparking off a power struggle on his death. The local fiefs formed themselves into larger groupings under powerful military lords and total anarchy reigned as samurai armies and armed bandits roamed the countryside looting and pillaging, burning and raping.

JAPAN AT WAR WITH ITSELF

Chaos
The hundred years from 1467 to 1568 are referred to as the 'sengoku period', 'a country at war with itself' or the 'warring states period'. This was full-blooded and aggressive feudalism. Central and even regional authority broke down, and power rested with local lords who dominated small feudal states with their bands of samurai. Power and influence were entirely based on military strength, which meant that the allegiance of the samurai was needed more than ever. They were rewarded with fiefs, titles and privileges of all kinds in a desperate attempt to retain their support.
Continual warfare meant that boundaries were constantly changing and if a lord weakened in the defense of his territory, there was no shortage of neighbors or vassals willing to challenge his rule. Everyone was suspicious of everyone else, and the lords were obsessed with conquest of their neighbors as the only way of avoiding their own overthrow. Because treachery and betrayal were so common, loyalty increasingly became the highest virtue. Nevertheless, the feudal idea of the lord-vassal relationship threatened to be submerged in a sea of self-seeking individualism as many of the samurai saw the opportunity to better themselves by the betrayal of their lord. Moreover, it was not just the samurai who were given the chance to improve their social standing. The constant battle, with its destruction and the need for arms and supplies, meant that artisans and merchants enjoyed a good deal of social mobility. The ever larger armies needed to be fed and provided for by their lords and foreign trade increased significantly. Leather was a vital commodity in feudal warfare, but it was only produced and worked by the 'eta', a despised outcast group who had previously been keptto the Kansai region. Now, of course, the eta were very
popular and lords took great pains to attract them to their region. Moreover, a number of towns developed as autonomous commercial centers, including Sakai, Yamaguchi and Osaka.

Less Chaos
In the second half of the sixteenth century, things began to settle down a little and local power consolidated in the hands of daimyo who enjoyed a greater control over their fighting men and resources. The thousands of small fiefs became hundreds as local lords allied themselves to prominent families and the political map of Japan simplified. Independent local power bases were reduced, and the samurai were obliged to live closer to their daimyo were they could be controlled more easily. There was a more methodical system of ranking among them so as to heighten the sense of subordination. Moreover, local lords would have their position protected and guaranteed by more powerful regional daimyo.
The alliances became ever larger and eventually, at the end of the sixteenth century, a succession of three daimyo from central Honshu built a strong enough coalition to force the submission of the other regional clusters and unify Japan. The first of these, Oda Nobunaga, who had originally come from fairly humble stock, defeated his chief rival, Imagawa, and became ruler of most of the central part of Japan. The strategic location of his power base had given him control of the main food plain as well as the imperial capital of Kyoto. He allowed the last of the Ashikaga shoguns, Yoshiaki, to retain the title since Nobunaga himself was not of the Minamoto family, but he took the title of 'shikken' (regent) instead.
Nevertheless, Nobunaga did not have complete control over the north or of the island of Kyushu in the west. On his death in 1582, murdered by one of his generals while performing in a play, he was succeeded by ToyotamiHideyoshi, one of his vassals. Hideyoshi continued and refined his predecessor's methods, combining brilliant military strategy with a strict control of land and peasants. In 1587, he inflicted a decisive defeat on the Shimazu and took control of Kyushu. Not having the same
qualms as Nobunaga about inventing lineages, he claimedFujiwara descent and forced the emperor to make him kanpaku.This marked the beginning of a process of restoring the imperial prestige in order to bolster that of the ruling shoguns.

New Battle Formations
By now, samurai battles had evolved a long way from the formal series of individual duels described in the ancient epics. This was partly due to the introduction of firearms, which tended to render obsolete individual sword-fighting skills. The most highly tuned swordsman is no match for a speeding bullet; a fact graphically illustrated by Indiana Jones in a famous scene from 'Raiders of the Lost Ark'. Furthermore, since one did not need to undergo years of training to use a firearm, it was possible to recruit large armies and deploy them relatively quickly. As the armies grew larger and formed ever bigger alliances, it became necessary to develop strict battle formations and tactics so as to control them. In typical Japanese fashion, they were highly formalized and given poetic names. A few of them are reproduced in the game.
1. 'Ganko', or 'birds in flight', is a flexible formation that can easily respond to a changing battle situation. Protection is provided primarily front and rear by arquebusiers and archers, although there are enough on the flanks to form a new screen if required.
2. 'Hoshi', or 'arrowhead', is designed for an all-out charge with the leading samurai poised to sweep through the arquebusiers at gaps created in the enemy ranks. Since it is a highly mobile and penetrative formation, the flanks do not need excessive protection.
3. 'Saku', or 'keyhole', is the deployment to defend against the 'arrowhead'. The archers and arquebusiers are angled to produce a crossfire to the incoming attack, while the samurai are braced to withstand the shock or a charge.
4. 'Kakuyoku', or 'crane's wing', which can be mistaken by the enemy for an 'arrowhead', is actually designed to surround an opposing force. The archers and arquebusiers, together with the leading samurai group, engage and distract the enemy while the rest of the formation spreads round to engulf them.
5. 'Koyaku', or 'yoke' (as in oxen rather than eggs), is adefense against either 'arrowhead' or 'crane's wing'.
The leading section meets the attack in its arms giving the rest time to gauge enemy intentions and deploy accordingly.
6. 'Gyorin', or 'fish scales', is an adaptation of the arrowhead and is adopted by a force which is outnumbered. Unable to risk all out assault, such a formation allows the smaller force to exert pressure on a particular point of the enemy ranks.
7. 'Engetsu', or 'half moon', is designed for when things are going really badly and an enemy surroundment is on the cards. The samurai ranks are spread and ready to respond to a worsening situation.

Relative Calm
By 1590, Hideyoshi had subdued all the remaining outposts of independence, and ruled a unified Japan. He considered foreign contact to be a weakening force on the Japanese nation, and gradually introduced laws to reduce outside influence and strengthen traditional patterns. He also took a firm grip on those patterns. The daimyo were subjugated and their estates reduced, shuffled around or even removed altogether. A strict land survey was performed in order to get a proper idea of land value so as to be able to allocate it more effectively, rewarding friends and penalizing enemies. The people were forbidden from moving village or occupation and the samurai from changing their masters. This was designed to stop social mobility and thereby produce societal stability. Moreover, Hideyoshi recognized the need to recreate a moral order to restrict the licentiousness and savagery that had grown up during the warring period. A rigid form of Confucianism was imposed with a strong hierarchical structure. However, there was an important difference between Hideyoshi's system and the Chinese model. In China, the highest level was occupied by an intelligentsia who attained their status by passing difficult civil service exams. In Japan, the samurai were at the top thereby creating an hereditary aristocracy. To reinforce this, in 1588, the Katana-Gari, or Sword Hunt, forbade non-samurai from carrying weapons. Furthermore, the samurai were moved from the land and into the towns. All of this brought peace and stability, but since Hideyoshi was really a warlord, it is perhaps not surprising that he decided to invade Korea in May 1592, as much as anything as an outlet for his megalomania and Japan's warlike energies. His real target was Ming China and then perhaps the riches of India, but although he took Korea comfortably enough, a stalemate soon set in and the Japanese eventually withdrew at Hideyoshi's dying request. His death came in 1598 and was followed by a two year power struggle which ended at the battle of Sekigahara in October 1600 and the victory of the third great daimyo, Tokugawa Ieyasu. Hideyoshi had actually left a son and heir in the person of Toyotami Hideyori who remained a threat to Ieyasu mainly because of the courageous and almost legendary figure of his mother, Yodogimi. The Toyotami family was finally destroyed in 1615 with the siege and destruction of Osaka Castle and the suicide of Hideyori and his mother. By this time, however, Ieyasu had taken the title of shogun, moved his headquarters from Kyoto to En (the modern Tokyo) and established the absolute monarchy of the Tokugawa dynasty which was to rule Japan for the next 264 years.

THE FIRST EUROPEAN ARRIVAL

Before describing the strongly anti-European Tokugawa bakufu, it is, of course, necessary to back-track seventy years or so to the first European landing on Japan and to examine the impact that European culture had in the brief period before it was banished. The sixteenth century was a time of European colonial expansion with the Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, English and eventually the French sweeping around the globe in search of trade and conquest. In fact, it was Portuguese traders who first reached Japan, landing on Tanegashima off the south coast of Kyushu in 1542.

Christianity
Following the usual pattern of European colonization, Christian missionaries arrived hard on the heels of the traders. A Papal Bull of 1502 had given Portugal the exclusive right to proselytize the Far East and accordingly in 1549 Francis Xavier and two other Jesuits landed under the auspices of the Portuguese crown. There was very
quickly a substantial Jesuit missionary presence and a goodnumber of Japanese converts. Some of these 'converts' no
doubt embraced the new faith so as to benefit from the commercial opportunities that Europe presented but many were committed enough to endure martyrdom during later persecutions.
At first the new religion was tolerated and under Nobunaga almost became fashionable. Japanese Christians even went on two pioneering visits to Europe and were received with great ceremony in Lisbon, Madrid and Rome. However, the situation changed dramatically with the accession of Hideyoshi. The water had already been muddied by squabbling among the increasing number of rival missionary groups, including the Franciscans, Dominicans and Augustinians. Hideyoshi, and Ieyasu after him, saw Christianity as a dangerous foreign ideology rather than simply a new religion and a series of increasingly harsh persecutions began.
In 1614, Christianity was banned and the missionaries expelled. Finally, following the Christian Shimabara rebellion of 1637-38 a policy of 'sakoku', or 'closed country', was introduced. All foreign influence, and especially that of Christianity, was ruthlessly driven from Japan which remained effectively free of the religion until the mid nineteenth century. It is remarkable to note however that small pockets of Christianity did survive the two and a half centuries of isolation and persecution. These loyalists, known as 'kukure Kirishitan', or 'crypto-Christians', emerged from out of the woodwork when the country eventually re-established relations with Europe.

Firearms
Of course, religion was not the only thing that the Europeans brought with them to Japan. The Portuguese introduced bread (and the word for it, 'pan'), tobacco ('tabako'!) and the idea of frying fish in batter, which became a national dish called 'tenpura'. However, perhaps more dramatically, the visitors brought firearms; a very popular arrival for a country engaged in spectacular, all-out civil war. The eagerness with which firearms were embraced is indicated by the fact that within two years the Japanese were manufacturing their own at Sakai and Yokkaichi. By the end of the sixteenth century, firearms and cannons had revolutionized the techniques of Japanese warfare. Huge fortifications and castles were built for the first time, close combat sword fights were replaced by long range shooting matches and cavalry were replaced by infantry. The armor changed, the armies became larger and more professional and were placed under central command. All of which makes it even more extraordinary to note that, just as the Chinese had invented gunpowder and then forgotten about it, by the 1630s Japan was at peace and the firearm had fallen into disuse. The mark of the samurai was still the sword. Even in the Second World War, Japanese army and navy officers fought a modern war with swords in their hands.

Less Than you Think
Thus the influence of the Europeans' first visit to Japan can be exaggerated. They made quite a splash initially but then sank with hardly a trace. They brought new knowledge, in particular with regard to naval construction and navigation, silver mining and refining and medicine, but the scientific gap between east and west was not as great in the sixteenth century as it had become by the nineteenth. The Catholic church still kept a firm grip on European scientific thought and the Japanese were a long way from being crude aboriginal natives with bronze age technology. Furthermore, the sakoku policy that the Tokugawa bakufu imposed ensured that most of what was new about European science was not spread very far.
Nevertheless, sakoku was not all that it was cracked up to be either. Theoretically, all contact with the outside world was severed. Foreigners were not allowed in and the Japanese were not allowed out. However, the real targets of sakoku were the Catholic Portuguese and Spanish who threatened the Japanese identity with their missions and the Japanese economy with the monopoly they held on trade. By the end of the sixteenth century they could maintain profit rates of 70%-80% (even 100% on occasion) which was obviously not good for Japan. The Protestant Dutch, and occasionally the English, were happy to leave religion out of it and were thus able to take over the trade. Though restricted to city of Nagasaki on the west coast, they were not excluded all together. The real point of sakoku was for Japan to regain control of its own destiny. Understandably, trade with China and Korea was interrupted by Hideyoshi's invasion but it had always been a part of the Japanese economy and soon started up again. However, by theoretically excluding all foreigners, any outside contact with Japan was now negotiated on Japanese terms. The central government gradually took control and established state monopolies. Previously, the basis of trade had been the export of Japanese silver in return for foreign silk, a process that was bound to work against Japan in the long term since silver is not a replenishable commodity. Now Japan began to develop its own silk industry, which by the nineteenth century was able to pay for rapid industrialization.

THE TOKUGAWA BAKUFU

For two hundred and fifty years, Japanese society was left to marinade in its own juices. Thus, while the structures emerged unchanged at the end of that time, the flavor and the forces within Japan were radically changed. On the surface, Japan was still a feudal society in the mid nineteenth century but the warlords had become aristocrats and the samurai had become bureaucrats. The economy was richer and stronger than before and yet the wealth lay not with the government but with the lowest strata of society, the merchants. Feudalism depends on at least the threat of war but the period of the Tokugawa bakufu was characterized more than anything else by widespread peace. During the warring states period, the Tokugawa family themselves had gained control of a quarter of the total land area of Japan. Perhaps even more significantly, their territory was central and contained most of the important economic sites, including mines, food plains and ports as well as the ancient capital of Kyoto and the emperor. The Tokugawa capital of En (modern Tokyo) was little more than a fishing village before 1550. By 1720 it had a population of one million, making it larger than either Paris or London at the time. Moreover, the combination of Osaka, Sakai and Kyoto also contained one million people and these two areas and the links between them dominated the national economy.

The Daimyo Fettered
In order to bring stability and control, the first Tokugawashoguns set about clipping the wings of those who might
challenge them. While some daimyo enjoyed wealth and some of them power, very few were allowed both. They were divided into three grades. The 'shimpan' (related) were the 23 daimyo who were part of the Tokugawa family and from among whom the next shogun could thus be chosen if the present one died without issue. The 'fudai' (hereditary) were also regarded as being loyal because they had pledged allegiance to Ieyasu before the battle of Sekigahara in 1600. Both groups were therefore allowed to hold senior administrative posts. The 'tozama' (outer) had not pledged before Sekigahara and were therefore regarded as a potential threat. Although some were extremely powerful, notably the Satsuma and the Chosho, they were excluded from administrative power.
Tokugawa government was a huge self-regulating bureaucracy and a very effective police state. The daimyo were weakened and closely monitored. There were strict controls on the number of armed men they could retain, the size of their castle fortifications and the social contacts they could maintain. Rights to land were only granted in exchange for oaths of allegiance which, if broken, resulted in exile to remote areas. Domains were broken up and rearranged so as to push trouble-makers away from strategic locations or surround them with loyal daimyo. The daimyo were also kept from cumulating too much wealth by compulsory public works. If they misbehaved in any way they might be ordered to rebuild a bridge, a shrine or even a castle. However, by far the most effective control came from the 'sankin-kotai', or 'law of alternate residence'. Under this measure, the daimyo were obliged to live in En for one year out of two and required to leave their wives and children behind in En, effectively as hostages, for the year that they lived in their own domain. Apart from being under the beady eyes of the shogun and having the links with their own regions weakened, the economic drain was crippling. Not only did the daimyo have to maintain at least two residences and travel between the two each year, in order to maintain their status, they had to do so in some style. The costs of sankin-kotai probably accounted for half of the average daimyo's annual income and this figure rose as high as 70% or 80% by the end of the Tokugawa era. The Samurai Controlled In a similar way, the samurai were tamed by their daimyo. Previously, the samurai had been scattered all over the countryside and drew their income from the small fiefs which they had been granted. As such they enjoyed a good deal of independence. Now they were moved into the towns to reside in and around the castle of their daimyo, supported by a fixed stipend from him, thus losing any private economic or political power. Moreover, a rigid and hereditary ranking structure was enforced within the samurai class itself. Marriage between members of the upper 'joshi' and the lower 'kashi' was forbidden. All samurai were locked into strata that dictated whether they were to be top officials, local bureaucrats or clerks and 'ashigaru' (low ranking foot soldiers).
The main problem for the samurai was that there was nothing much for them to do in peacetime. Japan was left with a class of two million people committed to following 'the way of the warrior', while everybody else was doing what they could to remove the possibility of warfare. Instead of being warriors the samurai became bureaucrats and controlled their masters domains administratively rather than by force of arms. This was not an easy transition, for the instincts and strengths of a fighting man are not the same as those of a civil servant. Confucian scholars urged them to value book learning as much as military training and many of them became quite learned. They also brought the fighting arts to a high point of skill and ceremonial but the capacity for actual battle fighting and tactics diminished through disuse. The samurai certainly enjoyed an impressive array of rather
quaint privileges but the economic position of many steadily declined. The pursuit of money was regarded as dishonorable
for samurai so their living was entirely dependent upon the stipend from their daimyo. However, since the daimyo had
less and less need of his private army he felt less and less of an obligation to pay them well. Furthermore, while the
samurai were expected to set an example of austerity and sexual reserve, many fell far short of the required
standard. The divergence of reality and ideal further weakened the daimyo-samurai relationship. If they were not
even setting a good example, really what was the point of them? In time, the samurai class as a whole became ratheran expensive luxury for Japanese society, a burden which wasincreasingly shouldered by the farmers.

The Castle Town Created
With the daimyo and their samurai vassals controlled, the specter of civil war gradually faded and economic development proceeded unhindered. The single most important socio-economic development had actually started during the last years of the warring states period. In a very short space of time and especially between 1580 and 1610, the daimyo built themselves impressive castles, in part stimulated by the introduction to Japan of firearms. Much larger than previous fortifications, it was possible to build them on the lowland plains rather than perched on mountain tops. They dominated the territory and, partially because there was room to build around them, became a focus for settlement. Initially, the samurai were assembled and housed around their daimyo but they were soon followed by the many artisans and tradesmen needed to service them. In this way, castle towns sprang up all over the country and formed the network of administrative headquarters through which the Tokugawa ruled the nation. Before 1550, nearly everyone had lived in farming and fishing villages. There were only a couple of cities and a half dozen towns. Almost overnight the basis of the cities of modern Japan had been formed. The castle towns provided the central source from which produce could be purchased that allowed a shift from self-sufficient agriculture to a market economy. Farmers could grow the crops best suited to their land in the knowledge that they could buy from the castle towns what they did not grow themselves. Moreover, the growth of urban culture provided the stimulus for a marked improvement in the road and communications network.

The Society Inverted
The castle towns also gradually turned the social structure of Japan on its head. The Tokugawa had emphasized and
enforced an existing four tier social hierarchy by passing laws designed to exclude social mobility and thus freeze society as it was. The ruling samurai class were followedin status by the farmers, the craftsmen and finally themerchants. However, as we have seen, the samurai gradually lost their political and economic power and were simply left with residual privileges. The farmers, although enjoying a relatively high status, were hard pressed to supply everyone, and in particular the samurai, with the food they needed. In fact, the farmers were often the most exploited and impoverished of all.
On the other hand, the craftsmen found themselves in great demand in this developing market economy and often lived under the jealous protection of the local daimyo. Ironically, the group that benefited most from the Tokugawa system was the one that the social legislation should have kept at the lowest level, the merchants. The opportunities for urban entrepreneurs were many and some of the merchant class achieved such wealth that they were almost indistinguishable from the samurai. A few were even able to purchase the right to wear swords and gained other privileges which they were not supposed to enjoy.
The Samurai Undermined
By the late eighteenth century, the Tokugawa system was breaking down. The samurai class as a whole, which of course included the Tokugawa shoguns, had been emasculated by the lack of battle. They were just as interested in the tea ceremony and calligraphy as fighting. The control that samurai had had of old was no longer credible. As the economy had grown and agricultural productivity risen, taxes had not really kept up. Thus, the government was slowly losing money to the merchants and became increasingly unable to pay for the samurai. The daimyo no longer needed private armies to maintain their position and the traditional daimyo-samurai relationship became very one-sided. On the other hand, the samurai often found themselves serving daimyo who were not up to the standard of their great-great grandfathers who had won their position in battle. Thus the loyalty of the samurai increasingly shifted from the daimyo to his home area. Perhaps most humiliating of all for the samurai was the rise all about them of a wealth of which they had no share. They found themselves seeking marriage to the daughters of merchants, committing infanticide in order to keep household costs down, setting up cottage industries making sandals and evengiving up their samurai status altogether in order to enjoy a more prosperous life as a commoner.
The irony of the samurai warrior is that, in the end, he was so successful in achieving his goals that he himself became redundant. He was an instrument of control and stood proudly at the top of an hierarchy of honor. In the end, the control which he established over Japan brought such peace and prosperity that his sword was no longer needed. The control he inflicted on the social and economic structures insured that he missed out on the benefits his discipline had produced. He kept his status but had locked himself out of the party. Had he simply been war-like and unscrupulous, he might have stirred up trouble to keep himself useful; but he was too honorable. One can talk of the samurai playing an important part in the recent creation of modern Japan but one can also argue against it. In any case, one is really talking of the residual class rather than of the warrior. The samurai of today still holds true to the abstract ideals of bushido and still proudly possesses his ceremonial swords. However, the battles of today are fought with computer terminals rather than swords. The true samurai was a rough and ready fighting man who held to a strict code of chivalry; a warrior who served.

WHAT HAPPENED NEXT

Although the temptation is strong to end the history of Japan with the end of the samurai, it is probably a good idea to sketch out the last hundred years as well. Having come this far, it would be churlish indeed to not mention the rise to world dominance of the land of the rising sun simply because every other history seems to be concerned with little else.
Historically, it is true to say that the last major samurai battles were fought at the beginning of the seventeenth century. The control and reform of the Tokugawa bakufu finished them off as an active part of Japanese culture and turned them into a ceremonial legacy of an honorable past. Nevertheless, it was not beyond the realms of possibility that, as the Tokugawa weakened, rival daimyo could have squabbled for power and the samurai could have made a
comeback. However much one can trace the seeds of modernJapan back into the Tokugawa regime (since one grew from the
other, this is not surprising), the seeds were also there for Japan today to be just another war-torn third world nation.
In 1853, the Americans decided to force Japan's hand and sent a squadron of ships to try to re-establish some trading and diplomatic links. This provided the stimulus that finally toppled the inward looking Tokugawa bakufu. In 1867, the young Emperor Meiji put himself forward as the political leader of Japan and by the following year had achieved full control. He put into action the process known as the Meiji Restoration. As well as re-establishing imperial power, over the next forty years Japan was changed from an isolated, agricultural feudal society into a powerful nation with a modern army and navy, good railways, an industrial base and a parliament.
By the turn of the century, Japan was winning wars against both China and Russia and gained worldwide prestige fighting on the Allied side during the Great War of 1914-18. Between the wars and under Emperor Hirohito, the country found herself in need of overseas markets and raw materials and there was a marked rise in nationalist feeling. By the Second World War, although without a fascist political ideology, Japan had more in common with the European dictators than the Allies and joined the war on the losing side. The first national defeat in Japanese history, brought about by the horror of the atom bomb, left a country economically and spiritually broken.
There was a serious reassessment of national values and expansion became a purely economic objective. The combination of mutual responsibility, competitiveness, loyalty and honesty soon produced spectacular growth. The Japanese factory workers showed an extraordinary acceptance of long working hours and a great enthusiasm for their jobs. Having let the world get along without them for thousands of years, the Japanese were now showing the rest of us how it was done. The rest, as they say, is history.