The New Capital

Question 1

Emishi

Answer 1

Main obstacle in the acquisition of more land by state. The Emishi, Ebisu or Ezo (蝦夷) constituted an ancient ethnic group of people who lived in parts of Honshū, especially in the Tōhoku region which was referred to as michi no oku (道の奥) in contemporary sources. The first mention of them in literature dates to AD 400,[citation needed] in which they are mentioned as “the hairy people” from the Chinese records. Some Emishi tribes resisted the rule of the Japanese Emperors during the late Nara and early Heian periods (7th–10th centuries AD).

Question 2

State the reason for military failures in the 8th century.

Answer 2

The military provisions of the Taihō (大鳳) code were inadequate. The ruling class in the 8th century were predominantly civilian in outlook due to Chinese and Buddhist influence. The immediate cause was inefficient working of the system of recruiting.

Question 3

Ainu

Answer 3

The Ainu or the Aynu (Ainu: アィヌ, Aynu, Аину; Japanese: アイヌ, Ainu; Russian: Áйны, Áĭny), also known as the Ezo (蝦夷) in the historical Japanese texts, are an East Asian ethnic group native to Japan (Hokkaidō and formerly North-Eastern Honshū) and Russia (Sakhalin, the Kuril Islands, Khabarovsk Krai and the Kamchatka Peninsula).

Question 4

State reasons for the arise of class of private warriors in the 8th century.

Answer 4

Private domains had developed in size and promoted local separation from government. There was disorder and violence. Farmers began to form their own defense and attach themselves to powerful landlords. Some wealthier magnates kept their own soldiery.

Question 5

Azumabito

Answer 5

“Men of the East” praised in early Japanese literature. Men recruited before the reform period for expeditions against Korea. They were well practiced in warfare against aborigines. Much more skilled than actual government forces.

Question 6

Sakanouye Tamuro Maro

Answer 6

Deputy to Seito Taishi. Celebrated in Japanese history as paragon of military virtues. Was able to push the frontier north against the “eastern barabarians.” Was first to be given title of Sei-i Taishōgun (征夷大将軍, or “barbarian-subduing Generalissimo.”

This same Tamuramaro is remembered in Aomori’s annual Nebuta Matsuri which feature a number of gigantic, specially-constructed, illuminated paper floats. These great lantern-structures are colorfully painted with mythical figures; and teams of men carry them through the streets as crowds shout encouragement. This early ninth century military leader is commemorated in this way because he is said to have ordered huge illuminated lanterns to be placed at the top of hills; and when the curious Emishi approached these bright lights to investigate, they were captured and subdued by Tamuramaro’s men.

Loyal to Emperor Saga, he quickly defeated the Heizei rebels during the Kusuko Incident in 810.

Question 7

Seito Taishi

Answer 7

Literally means “great general who subdues the eastern barbarians.” Appointed in 791 AD.

Question 8

Sei-i Taishōgun

Answer 8

“Commander-in-Chief of the Expeditionary Force Against the Barbarians”, a high military title from the early Heian period in the 8th and 9th centuries. Was given to military commanders during the early Heian period for the duration of military campaigns against the Emishi, who resisted the governance of the Kyoto-based imperial court.

Question 9

Shogun

Answer 9

The term shogun (将軍, lit. “army commander”) is the abbreviation of the historical title Sei-i Taishōgun (征夷大将軍, lit. “Great general appeaser of the barbarians”).

Question 10

Why were the Ainu able to hold out for more than twenty years against large campaigns directed towards them?

Answer 10

There are several factors. [1] stubborn character, [2] neutrality and positive assistance from pioneer settlers who resented the intrusion of the central government into the eastern border country where they free from taxation and had other liberties.

Question 11

Describe the conflict between rural and metropolitan interests that began in the 8th century and continued for three hundred years.

Answer 11

The expenditure of the central government (military, palaces, public works, roads, bridges) meant more levied taxes. The great landowners were determined to evade these new taxes. It was continuous struggle between administration and provisional notables for the effective control of agricultural land.

The real source of power in Japanese life was the land. The apparatus of government in the capital city was an artificial growth. The stream of edicts and rules from the metropolis did not succeed in changing the character of the agrarian society. The law had to be adjusted to society and not the society to the law.

Question 12

Describe the reason for the failure of the land laws of the Taihō reform (701 AD).

Answer 12

The elaborate, logical, symmetrical system of government borrowed from China was unsuited to the conditions in Japan. Ancient habits and the rice culture made the Chinese regulations unworkable in practice. The borrowed procedures were too cumbersome to adapt; requiring copious amounts of paperwork, examinations, reporting, etc.

Question 13

Handen-Shūju system

Answer 13

One of the major pillars of the Ritsuryō was the introduction of the Handen-Shūju (班田収受制) system, similar to the equal-field system in China. This regulated land ownership. Based on the registration, each citizen over 6 was entitled to a “distributed field”, subject to taxation (approx. 3% of crops). The area of each field was 2 tan (段) for men and two-thirds of this amount for women. The field was returned to the country at death. Land belonging to shrines and temples was exempt from taxation. Collection and redistribution of land took place every 6 years.

Eventually collapsed. An edict in 902 AD stated it had been in disuse for a long time (in some places since 850) and ordered it resumed.

Question 14

Ritsuryō

Answer 14

Ritsuryō (律令) is the historical law system based on the philosophies of Confucianism and Chinese Legalism in Japan. It defines both a criminal code (律, Ritsu) and an administrative code (令, Ryō).

During the late Asuka period (late 6th century – 710) and Nara period (710–794), the Imperial Court in Kyoto, trying to replicate China’s rigorous political system from the Tang dynasty, created and enforced some collections of Ritsuryō.

In 645, the Taika (or Taihō) reforms were the first signs of implementation of the system.

Question 15

Ukarebito

Answer 15

Term used to denote fugitives had left the service of their lords. Many had gone to work on private estates after leasing or selling their plots of land.

Also known as rōnin which literally means “wave man”. It is an idiomatic expression for “vagrant” or “wandering man”, someone who is without a home. The term originated in the Nara and Heian periods, when it referred to a serf who had fled or deserted his master’s land. It then came to be used for a samurai who had no master. (Hence, the term “wave man” illustrating one who is socially adrift).

Many reported as absconded or dead had in fact taken refuge in neighboring manors who could not be overpowered by provincial authorities.

Question 16

Describe the reason for the collapse of the Handen-Shūju system.

Answer 16

The allotment system was not appropriate for rice land in a country where the cultivator was deeply attached to to the small plot which he cultivated regarded as his own. Provincial governments usually favored local sentiment before any legal claims. heavy burden of tax, forced labor, and military service combined to drive the holders to either sell or lease their plots or simply abscond and seek livelihood elsewhere.

Question 17

List some of the abuses of the capital nobles in the 8th century Japan.

Answer 17

[1] the falsification of tax records, [2] the misappropriation of interest collected paid by farmers, [3] and the seizure of grain stocks held in reserve against short stocks.

Question 18

Kageyushi

Answer 18

A result of rampant illegal behavior of local administrators. The law required a newly appointed governor be given a release or clearance to his predecessor.

Established at the beginning of the Heian period (794–1185), to audit the accounts of local administrators who were retiring from office. Instituted to compensate for weaknesses in the earlier system of starting and terminating official appointments, the kageyushi in the 9th century became the single, if only partially effective, means of extending the power of the central government to the provinces. However, thereafter its control declined, along with that of central authority during the rest of the period.

Question 19

Shōen

Answer 19

From about the 8th to the late 15th century, any of the private, tax-free, often autonomous estates or manors whose rise undermined the political and economic power of the emperor and contributed to the growth of powerful local clans. The estates developed from land tracts assigned to officially sanctioned Shintō shrines or Buddhist temples or granted by the emperor as gifts to the imperial family, friends, or officials. As these estates grew, they became independent of the civil administrative system and contributed to the rise of a local military class.

With the establishment of the Kamakura shogunate, or military dictatorship, in 1192, centrally appointed stewards weakened the power of these local landlords. The shōen system passed out of existence around the middle of the 15th century, when villages became self-governing units, owing loyalty to a feudal lord, or daimyo, who subdivided the area into fiefs and collected a fixed tax.

Question 20

Kampuka or Kanpaku

Answer 20

The Kanpaku (関白) was theoretically a sort of chief advisor for the Emperor, but was the title of both first secretary and regent who assists an adult Emperor. During a certain period in the Heian period, they were the effective rulers of Japan.

One of the many extra-legal offices created out of the Japanese mind’s practical necessity in response to the impractical and unbending nature of Chinese code.

Question 21

Sesshō and Kanpaku

Answer 21

In Japan, Sesshō (摂政) was a title given to a regent who was named to act on behalf of either a child Emperor before his coming of age, or an empress regnant. The Kanpaku (関白) was theoretically a sort of chief advisor for the Emperor, but was the title of both first secretary and regent who assists an adult Emperor. The Kanpaku (関白) was theoretically a sort of chief advisor for the Emperor, but was the title of both first secretary and regent who assists an adult Emperor. During a certain period in the Heian period, they were the effective rulers of Japan. There was little, if any, effective difference between the two titles, and several individuals merely changed titles as child Emperors grew to adulthood, or adult Emperors retired or died and were replaced by child Emperors. The two titles were collectively known as Sekkan (摂関), and the families that exclusively held the titles were called Sekkan-ke or Sekkan family. After the Heian period, shogunates took over the power.

Question 22

Fujiwara no Mototsune

Answer 22

Mototsune invented the position of kampaku regent for himself in order to remain in power even after an emperor reached maturity. This innovation allowed the Fujiwara clan to tighten its grip on power right throughout an emperor’s reign. The office soon became hereditary in the Fujiwara family.

Fujiwara no Mototsune (藤原 基経, 836 – February 25, 891), also known as Horikawa Daijin (堀川大臣), was a Japanese statesman, courtier and politician of the early Heian period.[1]

He was born the third son of Fujiwara no Nagara, but was adopted by his powerful uncle Fujiwara no Yoshifusa, who had no sons. Mototsune followed in Yoshifusa’s footsteps, holding power in the court in the position of regent for four successive emperors.

Question 23

Kurōdo-dokoro

Answer 23

The Kurōdo-dokoro (蔵人所), also read as Kurando-dokoro and often translated as the Chamberlain’s office, was an organ of the imperial Japanese government established in 810 by Emperor Saga. It was set up outside of the statutory government structure described in the ritsuryō code and was placed directly under the emperor’s authority. Its original responsibility was to take care of the emperor’s archives and imperial documents as well as to attend to various personal needs of the sovereign. However, over the course of the 9th century, the office’s role and responsibilities expanded considerably, and by the end of the 9th century it had become a clear control point within the government. Through it the emperor was, for a while, able to exercise his direct influence over the bureaucracy. At the same time the emperor’s conduct of official business through the Chamberlain’s usurped much of the power and functions of the statutory Council of State (太政官, daijō-kan).

Question 24

Kebiishi

Answer 24

Kebiishi, body of police commissioners who constituted the only effective military force during Japan’s Heian period (AD 794–1185). The Kebiishi was the backbone of the administration during this time, and its decline about 1000 marked the beginning of the disintegration of central control over the outlying areas of the country.

In some provinces, the Kebiishi are said to have taken excessive powers, but rural disorder may had called from such drastic measures.

Question 25

Oryoshi and Tsuibushi

Answer 25

Extra-legal offices akin to Sheriffs and Chief Constables established as emergency measure but continued into the feudal period as means of keeping order in the country.

Question 26

State the Fujiwara family’s important contributions in the first five centuries of Japanese legislation starting in 645 AD.

Answer 26

[1] most of the announcements in the Reform Edict of 645 were the work of Kamatari, the founder of the clan. [2] The Taihō code of 701 were drawn up by a committee headed by Fujiwara Fubito and revised by him in 718. [3] Further amendments were made by under the superintendence of Fujiwara ministers while Fujiwara statesmen and officials played a leading part in the development of most of the extra-legal offices.

Question 27

Mi-Kyosho

Answer 27

A “Letter of Instruction” which the emperor was supposed to have authorized on the advice of his Ministers. A convenient practice by the Fujiwara family to issue orders on their own.

Question 28

Saichō

Answer 28

Saichō (最澄, September 15, 767 – June 26, 822) was a Japanese Buddhist monk credited with founding the Tendai school of Buddhism based on the Chinese Tiantai school he was exposed to during his trip to Tang China beginning in 804. Unhappy with the degradation found in Nara, he fled to the mountains and is perhaps the first to establish the mountainous solitude so characteristic of Japanese Buddhism. He founded the temple and headquarters of Tendai at Enryaku-ji on Mount Hiei near Kyoto which collaborated Indian Buddhism, indigenous Shinto and Chinese geomancy; guaranteeing the safety of the new capital below. He is also said to have been the first to bring tea to Japan. After his death, he was awarded the posthumous title of Dengyō Daishi (伝教大師).

Question 29

Tendai school of Buddhism

Answer 29

A Mahayana Buddhist school established in Japan in the year 806 by the monk named Saichō, posthumously known as Dengyō Daishi. The Tendai school rose to prominence during the Heian period (794-1185), gradually eclipsing the powerful Yogācāra school (Hossō-shū) and competing with the upcoming Shingon Buddhism to become the most influential at the Imperial court.

In Chinese and Japanese, its name is identical to Tiantai, its parent school of Chinese Buddhism; both Tiantai and Tendai hold the Lotus Sutra as the ultimate teaching of the Buddha and revere the teachings of Tiantai’s founder Zhiyi. In English, the Japanese romanization distinguishes the particularly Japanese history of the school and its innovations. These include an exclusive use of the Bodhisattva Precepts for ordination, an emphasis on the “Four Integrated Schools”, and Saichō’s focus on the “One Vehicle” teaching.

The school is regarded as displaying a certain national character, practical attitude, and matter-of-fact response to Far Eastern minds. Its success is owed to its approachable doctrines as opposed to the scholarly and metaphysical excess of most Nara schools.

Question 30

Kūkai

Answer 30

Kūkai (空海), also known posthumously as Kōbō-Daishi (弘法大師, The Grand Master Who Propagated the Buddhist Teaching), 774–835, was a Japanese Buddhist monk, civil servant, scholar, poet, and artist who founded the Esoteric Shingon or “mantra” school of Buddhism. Shingon followers usually refer to him by the honorific title of Odaishisama (お大師様) and the religious name of Henjō-Kongō (遍照金剛).

Kūkai is famous as a calligrapher and engineer. In legend he is attributed with the invention of the kana syllabary, with which the Japanese language is written to this day (in combination with kanji), as well as the Iroha poem, which helped to standardise and popularise kana.

Question 31

Shingon School of Buddhism

Answer 31

Shingon Buddhism (真言宗, Shingon-shū) is one of the major schools of Buddhism in Japan and one of the few surviving Vajrayana lineages in East Asia.

Known in Chinese as the Tangmi (唐密; the Esoteric School in Tang Dynasty of China), these esoteric teachings would later flourish in Japan under the auspices of a Buddhist monk named Kūkai (空海), who traveled to Tang China to acquire and request transmission of the esoteric teachings. For that reason, it is often called Japanese Esoteric Buddhism, or Orthodox Esoteric Buddhism.

The word shingon is the Japanese reading of the Chinese word 真言 (zhēnyán), which is the Chinese transcription of the Sanskrit word “mantra”.

Question 32

Explain how Shingon Buddhism superstition did not disfigure the Mantrayana Vajrayana in Japan as in other places.

Answer 32

The spells, charms, and incantations of Shingon seized upon by most believers was tempered by by the pure and practical taste of the Japanese people. They in a sense kept the superstitious excesses in check.

Question 33

Explain Shingon Buddhism’s contribution to Japanese fine arts.

Answer 33

Its doctrine was lofty but full of great mysteries that cannot be explained in simple language. Free use of symbolism and pictorial expression fostered with its arrival.

Question 34

Saga

Answer 34

Emperor Saga (嵯峨天皇, Saga-tennō, October 3, 786 – August 24, 842) was the 52nd emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. Saga’s reign spanned the years from 809 through 823.

Question 35

Kusuko Incident

Answer 35

In the 4th year of Emperor Heizei’s reign, he fell ill and abdicated; and the succession was received by Kanmu’s second son Saga, the eldest son having become a Buddhist priest. Shortly thereafter, Emperor Saga is said to have acceded to the throne.

Soon after his enthronement, Saga himself took ill. At the time the retired Heizei had quarreled with his brother over the ideal location of the court, the latter preferring the Heian capital, while the former was convinced that a shift back to the Nara plain was necessary, and Heizei, exploiting Saga’s weakened health, seized the opportunity to foment a rebellion, known historically as the Kusuko Incident; however, forces loyal to Emperor Saga, led by taishōgun Sakanoue no Tamuramaro, quickly defeated the Heizei rebels which thus limited the adverse consequences which would have followed any broader conflict.

Question 36

Pronouncement of 813

Answer 36

Made by Emperor Saga effecting that good government depended upon literature and progress depended upon learning whereas China was the source of both. The atmosphere at the Heian capital was becoming more and more Chinese in both social behavior and literary taste.

Question 37

Describe the society of court life in the 8th and 9th century Japan.

Answer 37

Stripped of most power they were the arbiters of literature and deportment. There was a heavy emphasis of Chinese literature and history. There was virtually no Japanese literature at the time and Japanese History was not deemed very important. Despite all this, one would not call this group intellectual in the most liberal of definitions. Learning was in the air.

Question 38

Daigaku

Answer 38

Daigaku (大学 or 大學) is the Japanese word for “college” or “university”. The system of education laid out in the codes allowed for one central college with not more than 400 students, male, 13-16 in age, and of princes and noble families.

Question 39

Kokugaku

Answer 39

Kokugaku (Kyūjitai: 國學, Shinjitai: 国学; literally “national study”) was an academic movement, a school of Japanese philology and philosophy originating during the Tokugawa period. Kokugaku scholars worked to refocus Japanese scholarship away from the then-dominant study of Chinese, Confucian, and Buddhist texts in favor of research into the early Japanese classics.

It also earlier refers to the code’s established provincial colleges with 20-50 students limited to the relatives of the district governors.