THE EPOCH OF THE GEN (MINAMOTO) AND THE HEI (TAIRA)
SUPREMACY OF THE MILITARY CLASS
DESCRIBED superficially, the salient distinction between the epochs
of the Fujiwara and the Gen-pei was that during the former the
administrative power lay in the hands of the Court nobles in Kyoto,
whereas, during the latter, it lay in the hands of the military
magnates in the provinces. The processes by which this change was
evolved have already been explained in part and will be further
elucidated as we advance. Here, however, it is advisable to note that
this transfer of authority was, in one sense, a substitution of
native civilization for foreign, and, in another, a reversion to the
conditions that had existed at the time of the Yamato conquest. It
was a substitution of native civilization for foreign, because the
exotic culture imported from China and Korea had found its chief
field of growth in the capital and had never extended largely to the
provinces; and it was a reversion to the conditions existing at the
time of the Yamato conquest, because at that time the sword and the
sceptre had been one.
The Mononobe and the Otomo families constituted the pillars of the
State under the early Emperors. Their respective ancestors were
Umashimade no Mikoto and Michi no Omi no Mikoto. The Japanese term
monobe (or mononofu) was expressed by Chinese ideographs having the
sound, bushi. Thus, though it is not possible to fix the exact date
when the expression, bushi, came into general use, it is possible to
be sure that the thing itself existed from time immemorial. When the
Yamato sovereign undertook his eastward expedition, Umashimade with
his monobe subdued the central districts, and Michi no Omi with his
otomo and Okume-be consolidated these conquests. Thereafter the
monobe were organized into the konoe-fu (palace guards) and the otomo
into the emon-fu (gate guards). Not military matters alone, but also
criminal jurisdiction, belonged to the functions of these two.
THE BUSHI
The earliest type of the Yamato race having thus been military, it
becomes important to inquire what tenets constituted the soldier's
code in old Japan. Our first guide is the celebrated anthology,
Manyo-shu, compiled in the ninth century and containing some poems
that date from the sixth. From this we learn that the Yamato
monono-fu believed himself to have inherited the duty of dying for
his sovereign if occasion required. In that cause he must be prepared
at all times to find a grave, whether upon the desolate moor or in
the stormy sea. The dictates of filial piety ranked next in the
ethical scale. The soldier was required to remember that his body had
been given to him by his parents, and that he must never bring
disgrace upon his family name or ever disregard the dictates of
honour. Loyalty to the Throne, however, took precedence among moral
obligations. Parent, wife, and child must all be abandoned at the
call of patriotism. Such, as revealed in the pages of the Myriad
Leaves, were the simple ethics of the early Japanese soldier. And it
was largely from the Mononobe and Otomo families that high officials
and responsible administrators were chosen at the outset.
When Buddhism arrived in the sixth century, we have seen that it
encountered resolute opposition at the hands of Moriya, the o-muraji
of the Mononobe family. That was natural. The elevation of an alien
deity to a pedestal above the head of the ancestral Kami seemed
specially shocking to the soldier class. But the tendency of the time
was against conservatism. The Mononobe and the Otomo forfeited their
position, and the Soga stepped into their place, only to be succeeded
in turn by the Fujiwara. These last, earnest disciples of Chinese
civilization, looked down on the soldier, and delegated to him alone
the use of brute force and control of the criminal classes, reserving
for themselves the management of civil government and the pursuit of
literature, and even leaving politics and law in the hands of the
schoolmen.
In these circumstances the military families of Minamoto (Gen) and
Taira (Hei), performing the duties of guards and of police, gradually
acquired influence; were trusted by the Court on all occasions
demanding an appeal to force, and spared no pains to develop the
qualities that distinguished them--the qualities of the bushi. Thus,
as we turn the pages of history, we find the ethics of the soldier
developing into a recognized code. His sword becomes an object of
profound veneration from the days of Minamoto Mitsunaka, who summons
a skilled swordsmith to the capital and entrusts to him the task of
forging two blades, which, after seven days of fasting and prayer and
sixty days of tempering, emerge so trenchant that they are thereafter
handed down from generation to generation of the Minamoto as
treasured heirlooms.*
*The swords were named "Knee-cutter" and "Beard-cutter," because when
tested for decapitating criminals, they severed not only the necks
but also the beard and the knees.
That the bushi's word must be sacred and irrevocable is established
by the conduct of Minamoto Yorinobu who, having promised to save the
life of a bandit if the latter restore a child taken as a hostage,
refuses subsequently to inflict any punishment whatever on the
robber. That a bushi must prefer death to surrender is a principle
observed in thousands of cases, and that his family name must be
carefully guarded against every shadow of reproach is proved by his
habit of prefacing a duel on the battle-field with a recitation of
the titles and deeds of his ancestors. To hold to his purpose in
spite of evil report; to rise superior to poverty and hardship; not
to rest until vengeance is exacted for wrong done to a benefactor or
a relation; never to draw his sword except in deadly earnest--these
are all familiar features of the bushi's practice, though the order
and times of their evolution cannot be precisely traced.
Even more characteristic is the quality called fudoshin, or
immobility of heart. That this existed in practice from an early era
cannot be doubted, but its cultivation by a recognized system of
training dates from the beginning of the thirteenth century, when the
introspective tenet (kwanshin-ho) of the Zen sect of Buddhism taught
believers to divest themselves wholly of passion and emotion and to
educate a mind unmoved by its environment, so that, in the storm and
stress of battle, the bushi remains as calm and as self-possessed as
in the quietude of the council chamber or the sacred stillness of the
cloister. The crown of all his qualities was self-respect. He rated
himself too high to descend to petty quarrels, or to make the
acquisition of rank his purpose, or to have any regard for money.
THE MILITARY ART
As for tactics, individual prowess was the beginning and the end of
all contests, and strategy consisted mainly of deceptions, surprises,
and ambushes. There were, indeed, certain recognized principles
derived from treatises compiled by Sung and 'Ng,* two Chinese
generals of the third century A.D. These laid down that troops for
offensive operations in the field must be twice as numerous as the
enemy; those for investing a fortress should be to the garrison as
ten to one, and those for escalade as five to one. Outflanking
methods were always to be pursued against an adversary holding high
ground, and the aim should be to sever the communications of an army
having a mountain or a river on its rear. When the enemy selected a
position involving victory or death, he was to be held, not attacked,
and when it was possible to surround a foe, one avenue of escape
should always be left to him, since desperate men fight fiercely. In
crossing a river, much space should separate the van from the rear of
the crossing army, and an enemy crossing was not to be attacked until
his forces had become well engaged in the operation. Birds soaring in
alarm should suggest an ambush, and beasts breaking cover, an
approaching attack. There was much spying. A soldier who could win
the trust of the enemy, sojourn in his midst, and create dissensions
in his camp, was called a hero.
*See Captain Calthrop's The Book of War.
Judged by this code of precepts, the old-time soldier of the East
has been denounced by some critics as representing the lowest
type of military ethics. But such a criticism is romantic. The
secret-intelligence department of a twentieth-century army employs
and creates opportunities just as zealously as did the disciples of
Sung and 'Ng. It is not here that the defects in the bushi's ethics
must be sought. The most prominent of those defects was indifference
to the rights of the individual. Bushido taught a vassal to sacrifice
his own interest and his own life on the altar of loyalty, but it did
not teach a ruler to recognize and respect the rights of the ruled.
It taught a wife to efface herself for her husband's sake, but it did
not teach a husband any corresponding obligation towards a wife. In a
word, it expounded the relation of the whole to its parts, but left
unexpounded the relation of the parts to one another.
A correlated fault was excessive reverence for rank and rigid
exclusiveness of class. There was practically no ladder for the
commoner,--the farmer, the artisan, and the merchant--to ascend into
the circle of the samurai. It resulted that, in the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries, gifted men of the despised grades sought in the
cloister an arena for the exercise of their talents, and thus, while
the bushi received no recruits, the commoners lost their better
elements, and Buddhism became a stage for secular ambition. It can
not be doubted that by closing the door of rank in the face of merit,
bushido checked the development of the nation. Another defect in the
bushido was indifference to intellectual investigation. The schoolmen
of Kyoto, who alone received honour for their moral attainments, were
not investigators but imitators, not scientists but classicists. Had
not Chinese conservatism been imported into Japan and had it not
received the homage of the bushi, independent development of original
Japanese thought and of intellectual investigation might have
distinguished the Yamato race. By a learned Japanese philosopher (Dr.
Inouye Tetsujiro) the ethics of the bushi are charged with
inculcating the principles of private morality only and ignoring
those of public morality.
MILITARY FAMILES AND THEIR RETAINERS
It has been noticed that the disposition of the Central Government
was to leave the provincial nobles severely alone, treating their
feuds and conflicts as wholly private affairs. Thus, these nobles
being cast upon their own resources for the protection of their lives
and properties, retained the services of bushi, arming them well and
drilling them assiduously, to serve as guards in time of peace and as
soldiers in war. One result of this demand for military material was
that the helots of former days were relieved from the badge of
slavery and became hereditary retainers of provincial nobles, nothing
of their old bondage remaining except that their lives were at the
mercy of their masters.
FIEFS AND TERRITORIAL NAMES
As the provincial families grew in numbers and influence they
naturally extended their estates, so that the landed property of a
great sept sometimes stretched over parts, or even the whole, of
several provinces. In these circumstances it became convenient to
distinguish branches of a sept by the names of their respective
localities and thus, in addition to the sept name (uji or sei), there
came into existence a territorial name (myoji or shi). For example,
when the descendants of Minamoto no Yoshiiye acquired great
properties at Nitta and Ashikaga in the provinces of Kotsuke and
Shimotsuke, they took the territorial names of Nitta and Ashikaga,
remaining always Minamoto; and when the descendants of Yoshimitsu,
younger brother of Yoshiiye, acquired estates in the province of Kai,
they began to call themselves Takeda.
It is unnecessary to pursue the subject further than to note that,
while the names of the great septs (uji) were few, the territorial
cognomens were very numerous; and that while the use of myoji (or
shi) was common in the case of the Fujiwara, the Taira, and the
Minamoto septs, the uji alone was employed by the Abe, the Ono, the
Takahashi, the Kusakabe, the Ban, the Hata, and certain others. It
will readily be conceived that although the territorial sections of
the same sept sometimes quarrelled among themselves, the general
practice was that all claiming common descent supported each other in
war. The Minamoto (Gen) bushi recognized as the principal family line
that of Tsunemoto from whom were descended the following illustrious
chiefs:
Minamoto (Gen) no Tsunemoto, commander-in-chief of local Governments
|
Mitsunaka
|
+---------+--------+
| |
Yorimitsu Yorinobu
|
Yoriyoshi
|
Yoshiiye
|
+----------+------------+-----+-----+-----------+-----------+
| | | | | |
Yoshimune Yoshichika Yoshikuni Yoshitada Yoshitoki Yoshitaka
|
Tameyoshi
|
+----------+------------+-----------+
| | | |
Yoshitomo Yoshikata Tametomo Twenty others
| |
| Yoshinaka
| (of Kiso)
|
+----------+---------+-----------+------------+
| | | |
Yoritomo Noriyori Yoshitsune Six others
A similar table for the Taira (Hei) runs thus:
Taira (Hei) no Sadamori (quelled the Masakado revolt).
|
Korehira (of Ise province)
|
-------
|
-------
|
Masamori (governed Ise, Inaba, Sanuki, etc.;
| quelled the rebellion of Minamoto
+----------+ Yoshichika).
| |
Tadamasa Tadamori (served the Emperors Shirakawa,
| Horikawa, and Toba;* subdued the
| pirates of Sanyo-do and Nankai-do)
|
Kiyomori (crushed the Minamoto and temporarily
| established the supremacy of the Taira).
|
Shigemori
In its attitude towards these two families the Court showed
short-sighted shrewdness. It pitted one against the other; If the
Taira showed turbulence, the aid of the Minamoto was enlisted; and
when a Minamoto rebelled, a Taira received a commission to deal with
him. Thus, the Throne purchased peace for a time at the cost of
sowing, between the two great military clans, seeds of discord
destined to shake even the Crown. In the capital the bushi served as
palace guards; in the provinces they were practically independent.
Such was the state of affairs on the eve of a fierce struggle known
in history as the tumult of the Hogen and Heiji eras (1150-1160).
*It is of this noble that history records an incident illustrative of
the superstitions of the eleventh century. The cloistered Emperor
Shirakawa kept Tadamori constantly by his side. One night, Shirakawa,
accompanied by Tadamori, went to visit a lady favourite in a detached
palace near the shrine of Gion. Suddenly the two men saw an
apparition of a demon covered with wirelike hair and having a
luminous body. The Emperor ordered Tadamori to use his bow. But
Tadamori advanced boldly and, seizing the demon, found that it was an
old man wearing straw headgear as a protection against the rain, and
carrying a lamp to kindle the light at the shrine. This valiant deed
on Tadamori's part elicited universal applause, as indeed it might in
an era of such faith in the supernatural.
THE HOGEN INSURRECTION
It has been related in Chapter XXII that Taiken-mon-in, consort of
the Emperor Toba, was chosen for the latter by his grandfather, the
cloistered Emperor Shirakawa, and that she bore to Toba a son who
ultimately ascended the throne as Sutoku. But, rightly or wrongly,
Toba learned to suspect that before she became his wife, the lady's
relations with Shirakawa had been over-intimate and that Sutoku was
illegitimate. Therefore, immediately after Shirakawa's demise, Toba
took to himself an Empress, Kaya-no-in, daughter of Fujiwara
Tadazane; and failing offspring by her, chose another Fujiwara lady,
Bifuku-mon-in, daughter of Nagazane. For this, his third consort, he
conceived a strong affection, and when she bore to him a prince, Toba
placed the latter on the throne at the age of three, compelling
Sutoku to resign. This happened in the year 1141, and there were
thenceforth two cloistered Emperors, Toba and Sutoku, standing to
each other in the relation of grandfather and grandson. The baby
sovereign was called Konoe, and Fujiwara Tadamichi, brother of
Bifu-ku-mon-in, became kwampaku.
Between this Tadamichi and his younger brother, Yorinaga, who held
the post of sa-daijin, there existed acute rivalry. The kwampaku had
the knack of composing a deft couplet and tracing a graceful
ideograph. The sa-daijin, a profound scholar and an able economist,
ridiculed penmanship and poetry as mere ornament. Their father's
sympathies were wholly with Yorinaga, and he ultimately went so far
as to depose Tadamichi from his hereditary position as o-uji of the
Fujiwara. Thus, the enmity between Tadamichi and Yorinaga needed only
an opportunity to burst into flame, and that opportunity was soon
furnished.
The Emperor Konoe died (1155) at the early age of seventeen, and the
cloistered sovereign, Sutoku, sought to secure the throne for his son
Shigehito, whom Toba's suspicions had disqualified. But
Bifuku-mon-in, believing, or pretending to believe, that the
premature death of her son had been caused by Sutoku's incantations,
persuaded the cloistered Emperor, Toba, in that sense, and having
secured the co-operation of the kwampaku, Tadamichi, she set upon the
throne Toba's fourth son, under the name of Go-Shirakawa (1156-1158),
the latter's son, Morihito, being nominated Crown Prince, to the
complete exclusion of Sutoku's offspring. So long as Toba lived the
arrangement remained undisturbed, but on his death in the following
year (1156), Sutoku, supported by the sa-daijin, Yorinaga, planned to
ascend the throne again, and there ensued a desperate struggle.
Stated thus briefly, the complication suggests merely a quarrel for
the succession, but, regarded more closely, it is seen to derive
rancour chiefly from the jealousies of the Fujiwara brothers,
Yorinaga and Tadamichi, and importance from the association of the
Minamoto and the Taira families. For when Sutoku appealed to arms
against the Go-Shirakawa faction, he was incited by Fujiwara Yorinaga
and his father Tadazane, and supported by Taira Tadamasa as well as
by jthe two Minamoto, Tameyoshi and Tametomo; while Go-Shirakawa's
cause was espoused by Fujiwara Tadamichi, by Taira no Kiyomori, and
by Minamoto Yoshitomo.
Among this group of notables the most memorable in a historical sense
are Minamoto Tametomo and Taira Kiyomori. Of the latter there will
presently be occasion to speak again. The former was one of those
born warriors illustrated by Yamato-dake, Saka-no-ye no Tamura-maro,
and Minamoto no Yoshiiye. Eighth son of Minamoto Tameyoshi, he showed
himself so masterful, physically and morally, that his father deemed
it wise to provide a distant field for the exercise of his energies
and to that end sent him to Bungo in the island of Kyushu. Tametomo
was then only thirteen. In two years he had established his sway over
nearly the whole island, and the ceaseless excursions and alarms
caused by his doings having attracted the attention of the Court,
orders for his chastisement were issued to the Dazai-fu, in
Chikuzen--futile orders illustrating only Kyoto's ignorance.
Tameyoshi, his father, was then removed from office as a punishment
for his son's contumacy, and thereupon Tametomo, esteeming filial
piety as one of the bushi's first obligations, hastened to the
capital, taking with him only twenty-five of his principal retainers.
His age was then seventeen; his height seven feet; his muscular
development enormous, and he could draw a bow eight feet nine inches
in length. His intention was to purchase his father's pardon by his
own surrender, but on reaching Kyoto he found the Hogen tumult just
breaking out, and, of course, he joined his father's party.
The relationship of the opposing nobles deserves to be studied, as
this was probably one of the most unnatural struggles on record.
CLOISTERED EMPEROR'S SIDE REIGNING EMPEROR'S SIDE
Sutoku (the Jo-o) Go-Shirakawa, younger brother of Sutoku.
Fujiwara Yorinaga Fujiwara Tadamichi, son of Tadazane
and brother of Yorinaga.
Fujiwara Tadazane
Minamoto Tameyoshi Minamoto Yoshitomo, son of Tameyoshi
and brother of Tametomo.
Minamoto Tametomo
Taira no Tadamasa Taira no Kiyomori, nephew of Tadamasa
Sutoku's party occupied the Shirakawa palace. Unfortunately for the
ex-Emperor the conduct of the struggle was entrusted to Fujiwara
Yorinaga, and he, in defiance of Tametomo's advice, decided to remain
on the defensive; an evil choice, since it entailed the tenure of
wooden buildings highly inflammable. Yoshitomo and Kiyomori took full
advantage of this strategical error. They forced the Shirakawa
palace, and after a desperate struggle,* the defenders took to
flight. Thus far, except for the important issues involved and the
unnatural division of the forces engaged, this Hogen tumult would not
have differed materially from many previous conflicts. But its sequel
acquired terrible notoriety from the cruel conduct of the victors.
Sutoku was exiled to Sanuki, and there, during three years, he
applied himself continuously to copying a Buddhist Sutra, using his
own blood for ink. The doctrine of the Zen sect had not yet prevailed
in Japan, and to obtain compensation in future happiness for the
pains he had suffered in life, it was essential that the exile's
laboriously traced Sutra should be solemnly offered to the Buddha. He
sent it to Kyoto, praying that the necessary step should be taken.
But by the orders of his own brother, the Emperor, the request was
refused, and the manuscript returned. Superstition ultimately
succeeded where natural affection had failed; for the ex-Emperor,
having inscribed maledictions on each of the five volumes of the
Sutra with blood obtained by biting his tongue, and having hastened
his demise by self-inflicted privations,--he died (1164) eight years
after being sent into exile--the evils of the time were attributed to
his unquiet spirit and a shrine was built to his memory.
*One incident of the fight has been admiringly handed down to
posterity. The duty of holding the west gate of the Shirakawa palace
fell to Tametomo and his handful of followers. The duty of attacking
it happened to devolve on his brother, Yoshitomo. To avert such an
unnatural conflict, Tametomo, having proclaimed his identity, as was
usual among bushi, drew his bow with such unerring aim that the arrow
shore off an ornament from Yoshitomo's helmet without injuring him in
any way. Yoshitomo withdrew, and the Taira took up the attack.
Not less heartless was the treatment of the vanquished nobles. The
Fujiwara alone escaped. Yorinaga had the good fortune to fall on the
field of battle, and his father, Tadazane, was saved by the
intercession of his elder son, Tadamichi, of whose dislike he had
long been a victim. But this was the sole spot of light on the sombre
page. By the Emperor's orders, the Taira chief, Kiyomori, executed
his uncle, Tadamasa; by the Emperor's orders, though not without
protest, the Minamoto chief, Yoshitomo, put to death his father,
Tameyoshi; by the Emperor's orders all the relatives of Yorinaga were
sent into exile; by the Emperor's orders his nephew, Prince
Shigehito, was compelled to take the tonsure, and by the Emperor's
orders the sinews of Tametomo's bow-arm were cut and he was banished
to the Izu island.* In justice it has to be noted that Go-Shirakawa
did not himself conceive these merciless measures. He was prompted
thereto by Fujiwara Michinori, commonly known as Shinzei, whose
counsels were all-powerful at the Court in those days.
*The celebrated littérateur, Bakin, adduced many proofs that Tametomo
ultimately made his way to Ryukyu and that his descendants ruled the
island. The great soldier himself died ultimately by his own hand in
the sequel of an unsuccessful engagement with the forces of the
vice-governor of Izu.
GO-SHIRAKAWA
Go-Shirakawa, the seventy-seventh sovereign, occupied the throne
during two years only (1156-1158), but he made his influence felt
from the cloister throughout the long period of thirty-four years
(1158 to 1192), directing the administration from his "camera palace"
(Inchu) during the reigns of five Emperors. Ambition impelled him to
tread in the footsteps of Go-Sanjo. He re-opened the Office of
Records (Kiroku-jo), which that great sovereign had established for
the purpose of centralizing the powers of the State, and he sought to
recover for the Throne its administrative functions. But his
independence was purely nominal, for in everything he took counsel of
Fujiwara Michinori (Shinzei) and obeyed that statesman's guidance.
Michinori's character is not to be implicitly inferred from the cruel
courses suggested by him after the Hogen tumult. He was a man of keen
intelligence and profound learning, as learning went in those days:
that is to say, he knew the classics by heart, had an intimate
acquaintance with Buddhism and astrology, and was able to act as
interpreter of the Chinese language. With his name is associated the
origin of the shirabyoshi, or "white measure-markers"--girls clad in
white, who, by posture and gesture, beat time to music, and, in after
ages, became the celebrated geisha of Japan. To the practice of such
arts and accomplishments Michinori devoted a great part of his life,
and when, in 1140, that is to say, sixteen years before the Hogen
disturbance, he received the tonsure, all prospect of an official
career seemed to be closed to him. But the accession of Go-Shirakawa
gave him an opportunity. The Emperor trusted him, and he abused the
trust to the further unhappiness of the nation.
THE HEIJI TUMULT
Go-Shirakawa's son, Morihito, ascended the throne in 1159 and is
known in history as Nijo, the seventy-eighth sovereign of Japan. From
the very outset he resented the ex-Emperor's attempt to interfere in
the administration of affairs, and the two Courts fell into a state
of discord, Fujiwara Shinzei inciting the cloistered Emperor to
assert himself, and two other Fujiwara nobles, Tsunemune and
Korekata, prompting Nijo to resist. These two, observing that another
noble of their clan, Fujiwara Nobuyori; was on bad terms with
Shinzei, approached Nobuyori and proposed a union against their
common enemy. Shinzei had committed one great error; he had alienated
the Minamoto family. In the Hogen struggle, Yoshitomo, the Minamoto
chief, an able captain and a brave soldier, had suggested the
strategy which secured victory for Go-Shirakawa's forces. But in the
subsequent distribution of rewards, Yoshitomo's claims received scant
consideration, his merits being underrated by Shinzei.
This had been followed by a still more painful slight. To Yoshitomo's
formal proposal of a marriage between his daughter and Shinzei's son,
not only had a refusal been given, but also the nuptials of the youth
with the daughter of the Taira chief, Kiyomori, had been subsequently
celebrated with much eclat. In short, Shinzei chose between the two
great military clans, and though such discrimination was neither
inconsistent with the previous practice of the Fujiwara nor
ill-judged so far as the relative strength of the Minamoto and the
Taira was concerned for the moment, it erred egregiously in failing
to recognize that the day had passed when the military clans could be
thus employed as Fujiwara tools. Approached by Nobuyori, Yoshitomo
joined hands with the plotters, and the Minamoto troops, forcing
their way into the Sanjo palace, set fire to the edifice and killed
Shinzei (1159). The Taira chief, Kiyomori, happened to be then absent
in Kumano, and Yoshitomo's plan was to attack him on his way back to
Kyoto before the Taira forces had mustered. But just as Fujiwara
Yorinaga had wrecked his cause in the Hogen tumult by ignoring
Minamoto Tametomo's advice, so in the Heiji disturbance, Fujiwara
Nobuyori courted defeat by rejecting Minamoto Yoshitomo's strategy.
The Taira, thus accorded leisure to assemble their troops, won such a
signal victory that during many years the Minamoto disappeared almost
completely from the political stage, and the Taira held the empire in
the hollow of their hands.
Japanese historians regard Fujiwara Shinzei as chiefly responsible
for these untoward events. Shinzei's record shows him to have been
cruel, jealous, and self-seeking, but it has to be admitted that the
conditions of the time were calculated to educate men of his type, as
is shown by the story of the Hogen insurrection. For when Sutoku's
partisans assembled at the palace of Shirakawa, Minamoto Tametomo
addressed them thus: "I fought twenty battles and two hundred minor
engagements to win Kyushu, and I say that when an enemy is
outnumbered, its best plan is a night attack. If we fire the
Takamatsu palace on three sides to-night and assault it from the
fourth, the foe will surely be broken. I see on the other side only
one man worthy to be called an enemy. It is my brother Yoshitomo, and
with a single arrow I can lay him low. As for Taira Kiyomori, he will
fall if I do but shake the sleeve of my armour. Before dawn we shall
be victors."
Fujiwara Yorinaga's reply to this counsel was: "Tametomo's method of
fighting is rustic. There are here two Emperors competing for the
throne, and the combat must be conducted in a fair and dignified
manner." To such silliness the Minamoto hero made apt answer. "War,"
he said, "is not an affair of official ceremony and decorum. Its
management were better left to the bushi whose business it is. My
brother Yoshitomo has eyes to see an opportunity. To-night, he will
attack us.". It is true that Tametomo afterwards refrained from
taking his brother's life, but the above proves that he would not
have exercised any such forbearance had victory been attainable by
ruthlessness. History does not often repeat itself so exactly as it
did in these Hogen and Heiji struggles. Fujiwara Yorinaga's refusal
to follow Tametomo's advice and Fujiwara Nobuyori's rejection of
Yoshitomo's counsels were wholly responsible for the disasters that
ensued, and were also illustrative of the contempt in which the
Fujiwara held the military magnates, who, in turn, were well aware of
the impotence of the Court nobles on the battle-field.
The manner of Yoshitomo's death, too, reveals something of the ethics
of the bushi in the twelfth century. Accompanied by Kamada Masaie and
a few others, the Minamoto chief escaped from the fight and took
refuge in the house of his concubine, Enju, at Awobaka in Owari.
There they were surrounded and attacked by the Taira partisans. The
end seemed inevitable. Respite was obtained, however, by one of those
heroic acts of self-sacrifice that stand so numerously to the credit
of the Japanese samurai. Minamoto Shigenari, proclaiming himself to
be Yoshitomo, fought with desperate valour, killing ten of the enemy.
Finally, hacking his own face so that it became unrecognizable, he
committed suicide. Meanwhile, Yoshitomo had ridden away to the house
of Osada Tadamune, father of his comrade Masaie's wife. There he
found a hospitable reception. But when he would have pushed on at
once to the east, where the Minamoto had many partisans, Tadamune,
pointing out that it was New Year's eve, persuaded him to remain
until the 3d of the first month.
Whether this was done of fell purpose or out of hospitality is not on
record, but it is certain that Tadamune and his son, Kagemune, soon
determined to kill Yoshitomo, thus avoiding a charge of complicity
and earning favour at Court. Their plan was to conceal three men in a
bathroom, whither Yoshitomo should be led after he had been plied
with sake at a banquet. The scheme succeeded in part, but as
Yoshitomo's squire, Konno, a noted swordsman, accompanied his chief
to the bath, the assassins dared not attack. Presently, however,
Konno went to seek a bath-robe, and thereupon the three men leaped
out. Yoshitomo hurled one assailant from the room, but was stabbed to
death by the other two, who, in their turn, were slaughtered by the
squire. Meanwhile, Masaie was sitting, unsuspicious, at the
wine-party in a distant chamber. Hearing the tumult he sprang to his
feet, but was immediately cut down by Tadamune and Kagemune. At this
juncture Masaie's wife ran in, and crying, "I am not faithless and
evil like my father and my brother; my death shall show my
sincerity," seized her husband's sword and committed suicide, at
which sight the dying man smiled contentedly. As for Konno, after a
futile attempt to lay hands on Tadamune and Kagemune, he cut his way
through their retainers and rode off safely. The heads of Yoshitomo
and Masaie were carried to Kyoto by Tadamune and Kagemune, but they
made so much of their exploit and clamoured for such high reward that
Kiyomori threatened to punish them for the murder of a close
connexion--Kiyomori, be it observed, on whose hands the blood of his
uncle was still wet.
Yoshitomo had many sons* but only four of them escaped from the Heiji
tumult. The eldest of these was Yoritomo, then only fourteen. After
killing two men who attempted to intercept his flight, he fell into
the hands of Taira Munekiyo, who, pitying his youth, induced
Kiyomori's step-mother to intercede for his life, and he was finally
banished to Izu, whence, a few years later, he emerged to the
destruction of the Taira. A still younger son, Yoshitsune, was
destined to prove the most renowned warrior Japan ever produced. His
mother, Tokiwa, one of Yoshitomo's mistresses, a woman of rare
beauty, fled from the Minamoto mansion during a snow-storm after the
Heiji disaster, and, with her three children, succeeded in reaching a
village in Yamato, where she might have lain concealed had not her
mother fallen into the hands of Kiyomori's agents. Tokiwa was then
required to choose between giving herself up and suffering her mother
to be executed. Her beauty saved the situation. Kiyomori had no
sooner seen her face than he offered to have mercy if she entered his
household and if she consented to have her three sons educated for
the priesthood. Thus, Yoshitsune survived, and in after ages people
were wont to say of Kiyomori's passion and its result that his
blissful dream of one night had brought ruin on his house.
*One of these sons, Tomonaga, fell by his father's hand. Accompanying
Yoshitomo's retreat, he had been severely wounded, and he asked his
father to kill him rather than leave him at Awobake to fall into the
hands of the Taira. Yoshitomo consented, though the lad was only
fifteen years of age.
THE TAIRA AND THE FUJIWARA
In human affairs many events ascribed by onlookers to design are
really the outcome of accident or unforseen opportunity. Historians,
tracing the career of Taira no Kiyomori, ascribe to him singular
astuteness in creating occasions and marked promptness in utilizing
them. But Kiyomori was not a man of original or brilliant
conceptions. He had not even the imperturbability essential to
military leadership. The most prominent features of his character
were unbridled ambition, intolerance of opposition, and unscrupulous
pursuit of visible ends. He did not initiate anything but was content
to follow in the footsteps of the Fujiwara. It has been recorded that
in 1158--after the Hogen tumult, but before that of Heiji--he married
his daughter to a son of Fujiwara Shinzoi. In that transaction,
however, Shinzei's will dominated. Two years later, the Minamoto's
power having been shattered, Kiyomori gave another of his daughters
to be the mistress of the kwampaku, Fujiwara Motozane. There was no
offspring of this union, and when, in 1166, Motozane died, he left a
five-year-old son, Motomichi, born of his wife, a Fujiwara lady. This
boy was too young to succeed to the office of regent, and therefore
had no title to any of the property accruing to the holder of that
post, who had always been recognized as de jure head of the Fujiwara
family. Nevertheless, Kiyomori, having contrived that the child
should be entrusted to his daughter's care, asserted its claims so
strenuously that many of the Fujiwara manors and all the heirlooms
were handed over to it, the result being a visible weakening of the
great family's influence.*
*See Murdoch's History of Japan.
RESULTS OF THE HOGEN AND HEIJI INSURRECTIONS
The most signal result of the Hogen and Heiji insurrections was to
transfer the administrative power from the Court nobles to the
military chiefs. In no country were class distinctions more
scrupulously observed than in Japan. All officials of the fifth rank
and upwards must belong to the families of the Court nobility, and no
office carrying with it rank higher than the sixth might be occupied
by a military man. In all the history of the empire down to the
twelfth century there had been only one departure from this rule, and
that was in the case of the illustrious General Saka-no-ye no
Tamura-maro, who had been raised to the third rank and made dainagon.
The social positions of the two groups were even more rigidly
differentiated; those of the fifth rank and upwards being termed
tenjo-bito, or men having the privilege of entree to the palace and
to the Imperial presence; while the lower group (from the sixth
downwards) had no such privilege and were consequently termed
chige-bito, or groundlings. The three highest offices (spoken of as
san-ko) could not be held by any save members of the Fujiwara or Kuga
families; and for offices carrying fifth rank upwards (designated
taifu) the range of eligible families extended to only four others,
the Ariwara, the Ki, the Oye, and the Kiyowara. All this was changed
after the Heiji commotion. The Fujiwara had used the military leaders
for their own ends; Kiyomori supplemented his military strength with
Fujiwara methods. He caused himself to be appointed sangi (councillor
of State) and to be raised to the first grade of the third rank, and
he procured for his friends and relations posts as provincial
governors, so that they were able to organize throughout the empire
military forces devoted to the Taira cause.
These steps were mere preludes to his ambitious programme. He married
his wife's elder sister to the ex-Emperor, Go-Shirakawa, and the
fruit of this union was a prince who subsequently ascended the throne
as Takakura. The Emperor Nijo had died in 1166, after five years of
effort, only partially successful, to restrain his father,
Go-Shirakawa's, interference in the administration. Nijo was
succeeded by his son, Rokujo, a baby of two years; and, a few months
later, Takakura, then in his seventh year, was proclaimed Prince
Imperial. Rokujo (the seventy-ninth sovereign) was not given time to
learn the meaning of the title "Emperor." In three years he was
deposed by Go-Shirakawa with Kiyomori's co-operation, and Takakura
(eightieth sovereign) ascended the throne in 1169, occupying it until
1180. Thus, Kiyomori found himself uncle of an Emperor only ten years
of age. Whatever may have been the Taira leader's defects, failure to
make the most of an opportunity was not among them. The influence he
exercised in the palace through his sister-in-law was far more
exacting and imperious than that exercised by Go-Shirakawa himself,
and the latter, while bitterly resenting this state of affairs, found
himself powerless to correct it. Finally, to evince his discontent,
he entered the priesthood, a demonstration which afforded Kiyomori
more pleasure than pain. On the nomination of Takakura to be Crown
Prince the Taira leader was appointed--appointed himself would be a
more accurate form of speech--to the office of nai-daijin, and within
a very brief period he ascended to the chancellorship, overleaping
the two intervening posts of u-daijin and sa-daijin. This was in the
fiftieth year of his life. At fifty-one, he fell seriously ill and
took the tonsure by way of soliciting heaven's aid. People spoke of
him as Dajo Nyudo, or the "lay-priest chancellor." Recovering, he
developed a mood of increased arrogance. His residence at Rokuhara
was a magnificent pile of building, as architecture then went,
standing in a park of great extent and beauty. There he administered
State affairs with all the pomp and circumstance of an Imperial
court. He introduced his daughter, Toku, into the Household and very
soon she was made Empress, under the name of Kenrei-mon-in.
Thus completely were the Fujiwara beaten at their own game and the
traditions of centuries set at naught. A majority of the highest
posts were filled by Kiyomori's kinsmen. Fifteen of his family were
of, or above, the third rank, and thirty were tenjo-bito.
"Akitsushima (Japan) was divided into sixty-six provinces. Of these
thirty were governed by Taira partisans. Their manors were to be
found in five hundred places, and their fields were innumerable.
Their mansions were full of splendid garments and rich robes like
flowers, and the spaces before their portals were so thronged with
ox-carriages and horses that markets were often held there. Not to be
a Taira was not to be a man."*
*Gen-pei Seisuiki (Records of the Vicissitudes of the Minamoto and
the Taira).
It is necessary to note, too, with regard to these manors, that many
of them were tax-free lands (koderi) granted in perpetuity. Such
grants, as has been already shown, were not infrequent. But they had
been made, for the most part, to civilian officials, by whose serfs
they were farmed, the proceeds being forwarded to Kyoto for the
support of their owners; whereas the koden bestowed on Taira officers
were, in effect, military fiefs. It is true that similar fiefs
existed in the north and in the south, but their number was so
greatly increased in the days of Taira ascendancy as almost to
constitute a new departure. Kiyomori was, in truth, one of the most
despotic rulers that ever held sway in Japan. He organized a band of
three hundred youths whose business was to go about Kyoto and listen
to the citizens' talk. If anyone was reported by these spies as
having spoken ill of the Taira, he was seized and punished. One day
Kiyomori's grandson, Sukemori, met the regent, Fujiwara Motofusa, and
failing to alight from his carriage, as etiquette required, was
compelled by the regent's retinue to do so. On learning of this
incident, Kiyomori ordered three hundred men to lie in wait for the
regent, drag him from his car and cut off his cue.
PLOTS AGAINST THE TAIRA: KIYOMORI'S LAST YEARS
All these arbitrary acts provoked indignation among every class of
the people. A conspiracy known in history as the "Shishi-ga-tani
plot," from the name of the place where the conspirators met to
consult, was organized in 1177, having for object a general uprising
against the Taira. At the Court of the cloistered Emperor the post of
gon-dainagon was filled by Fujiwara Narichika, who harboured
resentment against Kiyomori's two sons, Shigemori and Munemori,
inasmuch as they held positions for which he had striven in vain,
the Left and Right generals of the guards. There was also a bonze,
Saiko, who enjoyed the full confidence of Go-Shirakawa. In those days
any cause was legitimized if its advocates could show an Imperial
edict or point to the presence of the sovereign in their midst.
Thus, in the Heiji insurrection, the Minamoto received their severest
blow when Fujiwara Korekata contrived that, under cover of darkness,
the Emperor, disguised as a maid-of-honour in the household
of the Empress, should be transported in her Majesty's suite,
from the Kurodo palace to the Taira mansion at Rokuhara. The
Minamoto were thus transformed into rebels, and the Taira became
the representatives of Imperial authority. Therefore, in the
Shishi-ga-tani plot the part assigned to the priest Saiko was to
induce Go-Shirakawa to take active interest in the conspiracy and to
issue a mandate to the Minamoto bushi throughout the country. No such
mandate was issued, nor does it appear that the ex-Emperor attended
any of the meetings in Shishi-ga-tani, but there can be no doubt
that he had full cognizance of, and sympathized with, what was in
progress.
The conspiracy never matured. It was betrayed by Minamoto Yukitsuna.
Saiko and his two sons were beheaded; Narichika was exiled and
subsequently put to death, and all the rest were banished. The great
question was, how to deal with Go-Shirakawa. Kiyomori was for leading
troops to arrest his Majesty, and to escort him as a prisoner to the
Toba palace or the Taira mansion. None of the despot's kinsmen or
adherents ventured to gainsay this purpose until Kiyomori's eldest
son, Shigemori, appeared upon the scene. Shigemori had contributed
much to the signal success of the Taira. Dowered with all the
strategical skill and political sagacity which his father lacked, he
had won victories for the family arms, and again and again had
restrained the rash exercise of Kiyomori's impetuous arrogance. The
Taira chief had learned to stand in awe of his son's reproaches, and
when Shigemori declared that he would not survive any violence done
to Go-Shirakawa, Kiyomori left the council chamber, bidding Shigemori
to manage the matter as he thought fit.* Thus, Go-Shirakawa escaped
all the consequences of his association with the conspirators. But
Kiyomori took care that a copy of the bonze Saiko's confession,
extracted under torture and fully incriminating his Majesty, should
come into the Imperial hands.
*It is recorded that, on this occasion, Kiyomori, learning of his
son's approach, attempted unsuccessfully to conceal under priestly
robes the armour he had donned to go to the arrest of Go-Shirakawa.
A final rupture between the ex-Emperor and the Taira leader became
daily imminent. Two events contributed to precipitate it. One was
that in the year following the Shishi-ga-tani conspiracy, Kiyomori's
daughter, Toku, bore to Takakura a prince--the future Emperor Antoku
(eighty-first sovereign). The Taira chief thus found himself
grandfather of an heir to the throne, a fact which did not tend to
abate his arrogance. The second was the death of Shigemori, which
took place in 1179.
Shigemori's record shows him to have been at once a statesman and a
general. He never hesitated to check his father's extravagances, and
it has to be recorded in Kiyomori's favour that, however, intolerant
of advice or opposition he habitually showed himself, his eldest
son's remonstrances were seldom ignored. Yet, though many untoward
issues were thus averted, there was no sign that growing
responsibility brought to Kiyomori any access of circumspection. From
first to last he remained the same short-sighted, passion-driven,
impetuous despot and finally the evil possibilities of the situation
weighed so heavily on Shigemori's nerves that he publicly repaired to
a temple to pray for release from life. As though in answer to his
prayer he was attacked by a disease which carried him off at the age
of forty-two. There is a tradition that he installed forty-eight
images of Buddha in his mansion, and for their services employed many
beautiful women, so that sensual excesses contributed to the
semi-hysterical condition into which he eventually fell. That is not
impossible, but certainly a sense of impotence to save his father and
his family from the calamities he clearly saw approaching was the
proximate cause of his breakdown.
ENGRAVING: KIYOMIZU-DEKA TEMPLE, AT KYOTO
Results soon became apparent. The ex-Emperor, who had truly estimated
Shigemori's value as a pillar of Taira power, judged that an
opportunity for revolt had now arrived, and the Taira chief, deprived
of his son's restraining influence, became less competent than ever
to manage the great machine which fortune had entrusted to his
direction. The first challenge came from the ex-Emperor's side. It
has been related above that one of Kiyomori's politic acts after the
Heiji insurrection was to give his daughter to the regent; that, on
the latter's death, his child, Motomichi, by a Fujiwara, was
entrusted to the care of the Taira lady; that a large part of the
Fujiwara estates were diverted from the regent and settled upon
Motomichi, and that the latter was taken into a Taira mansion. The
regent who suffered by this arbitrary procedure was Fujiwara
Motofusa, the same noble whom, a few years later, Kiyomori caused to
be dragged from his car and docked of his queue because Motofusa had
insisted on due observance of etiquette by Kiyomori's grandson.
Naturally, Motofusa was ready to join hands with Go-Shirakawa in any
anti-Taira procedure.
Therefore, in 1179, on the death of Kiyomori's daughter, to whose
care Motomichi had been entrusted in his childhood, the ex-Emperor,
at the instance of Motofusa, appropriated all her manors and those of
Motomichi. Moreover, on the death of Shigemori shortly afterwards,
the same course was pursued with his landed property, and further,
Motomichi, though lawful head of the Fujiwara family, son-in-law of
Kiyomori, and of full age, had been refused the post of chunagon, the
claim of a twelve year-old son of Motofusa being preferred.* The
significance of these doings was unmistakable. Kiyomori saw that the
gauntlet had been thrown in his face. Hastening from his villa of
Fukuhara, in Settsu, at the head of a large force of troops, he
placed the ex-Emperor in strict confinement in the Toba palace,
segregating him completely from the official world and depriving him
of all administrative functions; he banished the kwampaku, Motofusa,
and the chancellor, Fujiwara Moronaga; he degraded and deprived of
their posts thirty-nine high officials who had formed the entourage
of Go-Shirakawa; he raised Motomichi to the office of kwampaku, and
he conferred on his son, Munemori, the function of guarding Kyoto,
strong bodies of soldiers being posted in the two Taira mansions of
Rokuhara on the north and south of the capital.
*See Murdoch's History of Japan.
THE YORIMASA CONSPIRACY
In 1180, at the instance of Kiyomori and partly, no doubt, because of
the difficult position in which he found himself placed with regard
to his imprisoned father, the Emperor Takakura, then in his twentieth
year, resigned the throne in favour of Kiyomori's grandson, Antoku
(eighty-first sovereign), a child of three. This was the culmination
of the Taira's fortunes. There was at that time among the Kyoto
officials a Minamoto named Yorimasa, sixth in descent from Minamoto
Mitsunaka, who flourished in the tenth century and by whose order the
heirloom swords, Hige-kiri and Hiza-kiri, were forged. This Yorimasa
was an expert bowman, a skilled soldier, and an adept versifier,
accomplishments not infrequently combined in one person during the
Heian epoch. Go-Shirakawa, appreciating Yorimasa's abilities,
nominated him director of the Imperial Estates Bureau (Kurando) and
afterwards made him governor of Hyogo.
But it was not until he had reached the age of seventy-five that, on
Kiyomori's recommendation, he received promotion, in 1178, to the
second grade of the third rank (ju-sammi), thus for the first time
obtaining the privilege of access to the Imperial presence. The
explanation of this tardy recognition is, perhaps, to be sought in
Yorimasa's preference of prudence to loyalty. In the year of Heiji,
he held his little band of bushi in the leash until the issue of the
battle could be clearly forseen, and then he threw in his lot with
the Taira. Such shallow fealty seldom wins its way to high place. Men
did not forget Yorimasa's record. His belated admission to the ranks
of the tenjo-bito provoked some derision and he was commonly spoken
of as Gen-sammi (the Minamoto third rank).
But even for one constitutionally so cautious, the pretensions of the
Taira became intolerable. Yorimasa determined to strike a blow for
the Minamoto cause, and looking round for a figure-head, he fixed
upon Prince Mochihito, elder brother of Takakura. This prince, being
the son of a concubine, had never reached Imperial rank, though he
was thirty years of age, but he possessed some capacity, and a noted
physiognomist had recognized in him a future Emperor. In 1170, at
Yorimasa's instance, Prince Mochihito secretly sent to all the
Minamoto families throughout the empire, especially to Yoritomo at
his place of exile in Izu, a document impeaching the conduct of the
Taira and exhorting the Minamoto to muster and attack them.
Yorimasa's story shows that he would not have embarked upon this
enterprise had he not seen solid hope of success. But one of the aids
he counted on proved unsound. That aid was the Buddhist priesthood.
Kiyomori had offended the great monasteries by bestowing special
favour on the insignificant shrine of Itsukushima-Myojin. A
revelation received in a dream having persuaded him that his fortunes
were intimately connected with this shrine, he not only rebuilt it on
a scale of much magnificence, but also persuaded Go-Shirakawa to
make three solemn progresses thither. This partiality reached its
acme at the time of Takakura's abdication (1180), for instead of
complying with the custom hitherto observed on such occasions--the
custom of worshipping at one or more shrines of the three
great monasteries--Enryaku (Hiei-zan), Kofuku (Nara), or Onjo
(Miidera)--Takakura, prompted by Kiyomori, proceeded to Itsukushima.*
*See Murdoch's History of Japan.
A monster demonstration on the part of the offended monasteries was
temporarily quieted, but deep umbrage rankled in the bosoms of the
priests, and Yorimasa counted on their co-operation with his
insurrection. He forgot, however, that no bond could be trusted to
hold them permanently together in the face of their habitual rivalry,
and it was here that his scheme ultimately broke down. At an early
stage, some vague news of the plot reached Kiyomori's ears and he
hastened from his Fukuhara villa to Kyoto. But it soon became evident
that his information was incomplete. He knew, indeed, that Prince
Mochihito was involved, but he suspected Go-Shirakawa also, and he
entertained no conception of Yorimasa's complicity. Thus, while
removing Go-Shirakawa to Rokuhara and despatching a force to seize
Mochihito, he entrusted the direction of the latter measure to
Yorimasa's son, Kanetsuna, who, it need scarcely be said, failed to
apprehend the prince or to elicit any information from his followers.
Presently Kiyomori learned that the prince had escaped to Onjo-ji
(Miidera). Thereupon secret negotiations were opened between Rokuhara
and Enryaku-ji (Hiei-zan), not that the Taira chief suspected the
latter, but because he appreciated that if Hiei-zan joined Miidera,
the situation would become formidable. Meanwhile, his trust in
Yorimasa remaining still unshaken, he sent him to attack Onjo-ji,
which mission the old Minamoto warrior fulfilled by entering the
monastery and joining forces with the prince. Yorimasa took this step
in the belief that immediate aid would be furnished from Hiei-zan.
But before his appeal reached the latter, Kiyomori's overtures had
been accepted. Nothing now remained for Yorimasa and Mochihito except
to make a desperate rush on Kyoto or to ride away south to Nara,
where temporary refuge offered. The latter course was chosen, in
spite of Yorimasa's advice. On the banks of the Uji River in a dense
fog they were overtaken by the Taira force, the latter numbering
twenty thousand, the fugitives three or four hundred. The Minamoto
made a gallant and skilful resistance, and finally Yorimasa rode off
with a handful of followers, hoping to carry Mochihito to a place of
safety. Before they passed out of range an arrow struck the old
warrior. Struggling back to Byodo-in, where the fight was still in
progress, he seated himself on his iron war-fan and, having calmly
composed his death-song, committed suicide.
CHANGE OF CAPITAL AND DEATH OF KIYOMORI
These things happened in May, 1180, and in the following month
Kiyomori carried out a design entertained by him for some time. He
transferred the capital from Kyoto to Fukuhara, in Settsu, where the
modern town of Kobe stands. Originally the Taira mansions were at the
two Fukuhara, one on the north of Kyoto, the other on the south, the
city being dominated from these positions. But Kiyomori seems to have
thought that as the centres of Taira strength lay in the south and
west of the empire, the province of Settsu would be a more convenient
citadel than Kyoto. Hence he built at Fukuhara a spacious villa and
took various steps to improve the harbour--then called Muko--as well
as to provide maritime facilities, among which may be mentioned the
opening of the strait, Ondo no Seto. But Fukuhara is fifty miles from
Kyoto, and to reach the latter quickly from the former in an
emergency was a serious task in the twelfth century. Moreover, Kyoto
was devastated in 1177 by a conflagration which reduced one-third of
the city to ashes, and in April of 1180 by a tornado of most
destructive force, so that superstitious folk, who abounded in that
age, began to speak ominously of the city's doom.
What weighed most with the Taira leader, however, was the propinquity
of the three great monasteries; Hiei-zan on the north, Miidera on the
east, and Nara on the south. In fact, the city lay at the mercy of
the soldier-priests. At any moment they might combine, descend upon
the capital, and burn it before adequate succour could be marshalled.
That such a peril should have been dreaded from such a source seems
strange; but the Buddhist priests had shown a very dangerous temper
more than once, and from Kiyomori's point of view the possibility of
their rising to restore the fortunes of the Fujiwara was never
remote.
Kiyomori carried with him to Fukuhara the boy-Emperor (Antoku), the
ex-Emperor (Takakura), the cloistered Emperor (Go-Shirakawa), the
kwampaku (Motomichi), and all the high Court officials with rare
exceptions. The work of construction at Fukuhara not being yet
complete, Go-Shirakawa had to be lodged in a building thirty feet
square, to which men gave the name of the "jail palace." Kyoto, of
course, was thrown into a state of consternation. Remonstrances,
petitions, and complaints poured into the Fukuhara mansion. Meanwhile
the Minamoto rose. In August of 1180, their white flag was hoisted,
and though it looked very insignificant on the wide horizon of Taira
power, Kiyomori did not underrate its meaning. At the close of the
year, he decided to abandon the Fukuhara scheme and carry the Court
back to Kyoto. On the eve of his return he found an opportunity of
dealing a heavy blow to the monasteries of Miidera and Nara. For, it
having been discovered that they were in collusion with the newly
risen Minamoto, Kiyomori sent his sons, Tomomori and Shigehira, at
the head of a force which sacked and burned Onjo-ji, Todai-ji, and
Kofuku-ji. Thereafter a terrible time ensued for Kyoto, for the home
provinces (Kinai), and for the west of the empire. During the greater
part of three years, from 1180 to 1182 inclusive, the people
suffered, first from famine and afterwards from pestilence. Pitiful
accounts are given by contemporary writers. Men were reduced to the
direst straits. Hundreds perished of starvation in the streets of
Kyoto, and as, in many cases, the corpses lay unburied, pestilence of
course ensued. It is stated that in Kyoto alone during two months
there were forty-two thousand deaths. The eastern and western
regions, however, enjoyed comparative immunity. By the priests and
the political enemies of the Taira these cruel calamities were
attributed to the evil deeds of Kiyomori and his fellow clansmen, so
that the once omnipotent family gradually became an object of popular
execration. Kiyomori, however, did not live to witness the ruin of
his house. He expired at the age of sixty in March, 1181, just three
months after the restoration of Kyoto to metropolitan rank. Since
August of the preceding year, the Minamoto had shown signs of
troublesome activity, but as yet it seemed hardly possible that their
puny onsets should shake, still less pull down, the imposing edifice
of power raised by the Taira during twenty years of unprecedented
success. Nevertheless, Kiyomori, impatient of all reverses, bitterly
upbraided his sons and his officers for incompetence, and when, after
seven days' sickness, he saw the end approaching, his last commission
was that neither tomb nor temple should be raised to his memory until
Yoritomo's head had been placed on his grave.
ENGRAVING: ARTIST'S SEAL
ENGRAVING: SWORD-GUARDS (Tsuba) HAND-CARVED IN BRONZE