THE ASHIKAGA PERIOD Thus began the Ashikaga line of Shoguns (1338-1565) and also a period of divided sovereignty which lasted 56 years, the Em peror Go-Daigo and his descendants reigning at Yoshino as the southern court and the Emperor KOrnyo and his descendants at Kyoto as the northern court. Though the former court is gen erally considered as legitimate, it ultimately had to yield and handed over the regalia to the court of Kyoto in 1392, when the double sovereignty ceased.
This arrangement was effected by Yoshimitsu, the third and ablest ShOgun (1367-1395) of the Ashikaga house, for he saw that the struggle between the rival courts was demoralizing au thority, ruining the peasantry and giving over the whole country to lawlessness and brigandage. During most of the Ashikaga period the imperial dignity descended regularly from father to son : few sovereigns abdicated and the country was not distracted by ex-emperors ruling de facto without any constitutional war rant. The Shoguns resided in Ky6to but did not attempt to gov ern by making matrimonial alliances with the imperial family. The court simply subsided into the second place, chiefly because hardly any revenue reached it. Yoshimitsu also checked piracy and restored some sort of order in Kyushu. He re-established commercial and diplomatic relations with China and the results were lucrative, though he had incurred much censure from pa triotic Japanese because in his official correspondence with the Ming emperor he tolerated and even used phrases which implied that Japan was a vassal state. Towards the end of his life he re tired and became a monk, but continued to govern the country from his palace Kinkakuji (the golden temple) in Kyoto. After Yoshimitsu's death and especially from the rule of Yoshimasa the eighth Shogun (1443-1474) onward, things went from bad to worse, but in reading the melancholy annals of the Ashikaga— one long catalogue of individual debauchery and tragedies and of ruinous wars between the great feudal houses—we must not forget that this was also the golden age of Japanese painting, when some of the best literature was produced and the NO drama was invented. Art, it is true, flourished chiefly in monasteries and its inspiration, largely Chinese, was due to the intercourse with China promoted by Yoshimitsu's policy. Still, this art was by no means devoid of vigour and originality and the monasteries could not have produced such talent had the general intelligence of the age been stagnant. Disastrous as was the strife of noble houses, it at least stimulated the spirit of adventure and offered a career to men of ability, regardless of birth. The system of serfdom which had prevailed for more than a thousand years was broken up, and no chieftain could hope to hold his own unless he could attract men to his service and maintain a moderately just and efficient administration within his own domains.
Nevertheless, it is impossible to give a favourable account of either the capital or the provinces during the Ashikaga rule of 15 Shoguns. Eleven were minors at their accession, nine ab dicated, five died in exile, and at least two came to violent ends. Just as the H6jo regents had ruled instead of the Minamoto ShOguns. so officials called wardens (KwanryO) took the power from the Ashikaga ShOguns and fought for it among themselves. This arrangement became so much a matter of course that the three houses (Shiba, Hosokawa and Hatakeyama) who claimed the right to hold the office were called Sankwan, or the three warden families. By the middle of the i 5th century Kyoto was in ruins and reduced to a population of 22,000.
Nor were things any better in the provinces. Taxation is said to have amounted to 7o% and the unfortunate cultivators had to pay not only regular imposts but also extraordinary taxes called Dansen levied for special purposes sometimes more than once in a year. This resulted in frequent popular tumults de manding a Tokusei or benevolent act of the Government, that is, cancellation of debts. In the time of Yoshimasa alone there were 13 such Tokusei. The Kwanto was governed by re gents taken from another branch of the Ashikaga family, but after about 1440 their authority became precarious. The whole region was practically independent of Kyoto and the chief power was in the hands of the Uyesugi family. Disastrous dissensions in the great houses of Shiba and Hatakeyama known as the wars of Onin (from the name of the period when they began in wasted the country for ten years. Soon afterwards another war broke out, occasioned by internal jealousies of the Hosokawa family. But, long as the struggle lasted, it ended in nothing: the antagonists wore themselves out and in the 16th century both Ashikagas and Hosokawas disappeared. In this century, one of the most eventful in the history of Japan, two features are spe cially remarkable. The first is the almost simultaneous rise of three great men, Nobunaga (1534-1582), Hideyoshi (1536-1598) and Iyeyasu (1542-1616) whose successive efforts, though they consisted of little but war, ended by giving their country unity and peace. The second feature is the discovery of Japan by the Portuguese in 1542 and the arrival of European merchants and missionaries.