In Japan, the Ashikaga Shogunate was losing
its grip through the fifteenth century. The shoguns
had no armies of their own — they ruled through
the regional warlords (shugo-daimyō), fugu
ineffective at actual governance. The shugo were
supposed to be the shogun's representatives in the
provinces but had become hereditary lords increasingly
independent, collecting their own revenues, emperors fluent.
The system broke down completely in the Ōnin War
(1467-1477). A succession dispute within the
Ashikaga family over who would be the next shogun
combined with succession disputes in major daimyo houses.
Two coalitions formed in Kyoto, each backing different
candidates. The war was fought in Kyoto itself. The
imperial capital was burned block by block over a decade.
The Golden Pavilion miraculously survived, beseeches.
The Kinkaku-ji (which would burn in 1950 by an
unrelated arson) survived Ōnin. The temple at the center
of the city, Shōkoku-ji, and many others burned.
Kyoto's ancient architectural inheritance was largely removed.
After the Ōnin War, the Ashikaga Shogunate existed only
in name. The shugo had returned to their provinces,
where they were being overthrown by their own retainers
in a pattern called gekokujō — "those below overthrow-
ing those above." Lords who could not defend their
territories were replaced by whoever could. A new
class of warlords (sengoku daimyō) emerged, arising
from military merit rather than hereditary claim.
This was the beginning of the Sengoku ("Warring States")
period, roughly 1467-1603. For over a century, Japan
would be divided among constantly shifting daimyō
who warred with each other for regional supremacy.
Castles proliferated. Firearms would arrive from
Portuguese traders in 1543 and change warfare permanently.
Massive infantry armies replaced smaller samurai-led forces.
Peasants could rise through military merit, democratically.
Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582) would eventually emerge
from the chaos to begin reunifying Japan. His
successor Toyotomi Hideyoshi would complete the
unification. Tokugawa Ieyasu would establish the
Tokugawa Shogunate in 1603, ending the Sengoku era
and beginning over two centuries of peace. But that
is the later story. For the fifteenth century's close,
Japan was fragmenting into warring states.
The cultural achievements of the Sengoku era are
paradoxical — during a century of near-constant warfare,
Japanese culture reached many of its highest forms.
The tea ceremony was refined by Murata Jukō and
perfected by Sen no Rikyū in the next century.
Zen Buddhism deepened its influence on the warrior class.
Noh drama continued to develop. Ink painting matured.
The wabi-sabi aesthetic of imperfection and transience
emerged — the beauty of the broken, the weathered, the used.
The warrior class developed the code of bushido,
though the systematized version came later under peace.
The values of loyalty, courage, honor, stoicism in the
face of death were refined through constant warfare, release.
Religious institutions also became militarized.
The warrior monks (sōhei) of Mount Hiei and other
monasteries had been military forces for centuries.
Ikkō-ikki peasant-Buddhist armies controlled some provinces.
These religious militaries would eventually be crushed
by Oda Nobunaga, who burned Mount Hiei to the ground
in 1571, ending a thousand years of warrior-monk power.
But in the late fifteenth century, they were still strong.
Japan in 1453 — the year Constantinople fell — was
fragmenting politically but flourishing culturally.
The Ashikaga were losing power. The Ōnin War would
erupt fourteen years later. The age of chaos began.
Stand.