The Sengoku Period

The Sengoku Period. The Sengoku ('Warring States') period (1467-1615) was Japan's century and a half of total civil war. When the Onin War (1467-1477) destroyed both Kyoto and the Ashikaga shogunate's authority, real power dissolved into the hands of the sengoku daimyo - warlords who seized the provinces, built castle-towns, issued house laws, and fought endless wars of survival and conquest: the Takeda and Uesugi of the east, the Mori of the west, the Hojo of Odawara, the Imagawa, Oda and many more.

The age remade Japanese war and society. Massed ashigaru (foot-soldier) armies of pikemen replaced samurai duels; castles grew from hill forts into the great stone keeps; and after the Portuguese landed at Tanegashima (1543), the daimyo adopted guns with astonishing speed - at Nagashino (1575) Oda Nobunaga's ranks of 3,000 arquebusiers destroyed the Takeda cavalry, the most famous volley in Japanese history. 'Gekokujo' - the low overthrowing the high - was the era's watchword, and talented men of humble birth could rise to rule provinces.

Three unifiers ended the wars. Oda Nobunaga, from minor Owari, broke the old powers - burning the warrior-monks of Enryaku-ji, destroying the Takeda and the Ikko-ikki Buddhist leagues - and held central Japan when treachery killed him at Honno-ji (1582). His brilliant general Toyotomi Hideyoshi, a peasant's son, finished the unification (1590), froze the social order with his 'sword hunt', and died after two ruinous invasions of Korea (1592-1598). Tokugawa Ieyasu won the final contest at Sekigahara (1600), took the title shogun (1603), and eliminated the Toyotomi heir at Osaka Castle (1615).

The Sengoku century bequeathed Japan its unified early-modern state, its castle cities, and its most celebrated heroes - Nobunaga, Hideyoshi and Ieyasu remain the benchmarks of Japanese leadership - while its wars burned out the old medieval order of court, temple and shugo for good.

To read more about this topic:

Britannica: Sengoku period World History Encyclopedia: Sengoku Period World History Encyclopedia: Japanese Castles