By Angela Black

Text: Holt World History

Japan’s Military Society

Figure 1: A Samurai Warrior

As Heian high culture flourished around the emperor
and the aristocrats, the emperor lost touch with the people of
Japan. As a result, the government weakened and powerful
nobles began to fight each other for land. These wars made it
difficult to grow food and many peasants became bandits and
thieves.
Daimyos, Japan large land owners needed to protect their
lands and hired professionally trained warriors called Samurai.
The Samurai were very loyal to their lords and they lived by a
strict code of rules called Bushido eventually the Bushido code
of rule came to influence Japanese society to the present day.
Samurai warriors were paid by their lords in land or food
however, those who were paid in land became very powerful.
Dissatisfied with how Japan was being run nobles decided to
fight for leadership. Two powerful clans fought for over 30 years for power. The Minamoto clan was
the victor and its leader became the most important ruler in Japan and he took the name Shogun. The
Shogun did not get rid of the emperor but instead allowed him to remain as a figurehead (A ruler with
no real power. Real power was in the hands of someone else.)
Japan faced many challenges from invasion and internal rebellion. In 1274 and 1281 the
Mongol emperor of China, Kublai Khan, sent armies to conquer Japan. With the timely occurrence of
storms, the Japanese were able to defeat them. Internally the emperor wanted to regain his political
power, and the daimyo wanted to break free of the Shogun’s power. This resulted in an outbreak of
small wars all over Japan. In the 1400s the Shoguns began to lose their political power to the daimyo
who ruled their lands and the emperor remained powerless. At this time Japan had no central
leadership.
In the 1500s the daimyo began to fight each other for more power and to unify Japan. The first
was Oda Nobunaga who for the first time in Japan used guns, from the Portuguese to defeat his
opponents. When he died, other daimyo have continued to try to unify Japan and by 1600 Tokugawa
Leyasu was able to conquer all of his enemies and the emperor made him Shogun of all Japan. It was
during this Shogunate that Japan started to trade with many countries and Christian missionaries
came to Japan. The Tokugawa family led Japan until 1868.
Not all of the Shoguns in Japan favoured contact with foreign nations. They were concerned that
Japan would lose its culture and that the Shoguns would lose their power. In the 1630s the shogun
began to practice Isolationism. He closed Japan off from the rest of the world by restricting trade with
other countries. He also banned the use of guns this helped to prolong the era of the samurai until the
1800s.

Questions
By Angela Black
Text: Holt World History

1. What was the relationship between samurai and daimyo?

2. What is Bushido?
3. Why did the first shogun keep the emperor as a figurehead?
4. Who invaded Japan in the 13th century?
5. How did the daimyo help weaken the shoguns?
Research
1. How did isolation impact Japan positively and negatively?
2. Why does a samurai warrior carry a long and short sword?