During the Muromachi shogunate period, the shogunate was the "Shogun of Seiyi" served by the Ashikaga family governor, while the vice-official within the shogunate was the "governor" of the Ashikaga clan.
Muromachi shogunate structure
As early as the Muromachi shogunate' first shogun, Ashikaga Takashi, was appointed as a shogun of the Seiyi shogunate, Takashi Nao, a member of the Ashikaga clan, became the "deacon" of the shogunate, assisting the shogun in handling government affairs. Later, the "deacon" was renamed "steward", and this position was monopolized by the three daimyōs of the Ashikaga clan, hosokawa Kyosho, Hatoyama Kingo, and Shiro Takee, who were also known as "three pipe collars". When Japan entered the Sengoku period, the shogunate was headed by Hosokawa Katsumoto, one of the "three management leaders".
Hosokawa Katsumoto was born in the second year of Nagasō (1430), his father Hosokawa Nobuyuki was the governor of the Hosokawa Kyosho clan, and was also the guardian of the four kingdoms of Settsu, Tanba, Sanuki, and Tosa, and his mother was the daughter of the guardian of Kyogoku Takamitsu of the Three Kingdoms of TheOsho, Izumo, Hideki, and Hida. Judging from his origin, it is not an exaggeration to say that Hosokawa Katsumoto was born with a golden key.
Hosokawa Katsumoto's nickname is "Smart Maru", which is a nickname passed down from generation to generation by the Hosokawa Kyosho family. In the first year of Kagi (1441), Ashikaga Yoshikichi, the sixth shogun of the Muromachi shogunate, was assassinated at a banquet by his courtiers Akamatsu Mansuke and Akamatsu Jiyasu, and Hosokawa Katsumoto's father, Hosokawa Takeyuki, was also wounded because he accompanied the shogun to the banquet. After the shogun's death, Hosokawa took the lead in the shogunate, supporting Chiya TeaMaru, the son of ashikaga Yoshinori, and attacked the Akamatsu family. Unfortunately, Hosokawa died the following year at the age of forty-three due to complications caused by his injuries.
Hosokawa Katsumoto was moto at the age of eleven, and was given the name Hosokawa Katsumoto from the shogun Ashikaga Yoshikatsu (Chiya Tea Maru). Hosokawa Katsumoto was only thirteen years old when his father died, but fortunately, the Hosokawa clan was prominent in Japan at that time, in addition to the Hosokawa clan's chief leader Hosokawa Kyoshiro family, there were also the Hosoru Awawa Guardian Family, Awaji Guardian Family, Wazumigami Guardian Family, WazumiShita Guardian Family, Bichu Guardian Family, etc., which was the strongest family in Japan at that time. In addition, Hosokawa Katsumoto's uncle Hosokawa Nobuhide did not bully his nephew into seeking the position of governor of the family as a young man, as other guardian families did, but supported him as a descendant of Hosokawa Katsumoto. Since then, the Hosokawa clan has created the family business of the "Hosokawa Noboro Family" and has become the elder of the Hosokawa Kyosho family.
Hosokawa Katsumoto
In the second year of Bunan (1445), at the age of sixteen, Hosokawa Katsumoto became the shogunate, and two years later, Hosokawa Katsumoto married the adopted daughter of Yamana Muneyoshi and formed an in-law relationship with the Yamana clan. Like the Kyogoku clan from Hosokawa Katsumoto's mother, the Yamana clan was also a family with the qualification to serve as a waiter, especially after the crusade against the Akamatsu family, and the Yamana clan occupied the old domain of the Akamatsu family, becoming a family second only to the Hosokawa clan. The alliance between the two families made Hosokawa Katsumoto the youngest and most powerful samurai in Japan after the shogun.
Hosokawa Katsumoto, who was the head of the shogunate, was not at all troubled, and in order to suppress the forces of another "three-pipe leader", Hatoyama Kingo's family, Hosokawa Katsumotomoto's spirit of "two whatevers"--all the Hosokawa family supported by Hatoyama held the state, and all the Hosokawa family who supported hatayama held the country supported it, and set off wars in various places. For example, when Hatoyama supported the Yamato kingdom's Yuechi Iei, Hosokawa Katsumoto turned to support Kotoshi Ieyasu's rival, Shōjin Mitsunomi; Hatoyama Heldgun had his younger brother Hatoyama Tsuna as the heir in his early years, and after the birth of his son, he turned to his son Hatoyama Yoshinobu as the heir, and Hosokawa Katsumoto turned to support Hatoyama Andefu and his descendants.
After the death of Hatoyama Nobuki, Hatayama Yoshinobu, the son of Hatayama Nobuki, and Hatoyama Yasaburo, the son of Hatoyama Nobuyoshi, and Hatoyama, the governor of Hatoyama, naturally enjoyed seeing the hatayama family fighting among themselves, and behind his back, hatayama Yoshinobu was exiled. In addition to the infighting among the Hatoyama family, the Highest Ranking of the "Three Pipe Lords", the Spo Wuwei family, was also divided by the extinction of the family governor, and the Spo Yoshitoshi, who was from the Takeo family of Ōno Shiro, was admitted to the Jizong family, but because of discord with his family and offending the shogun, he was exiled, and Washirin, who was from the Shibukawa clan, another branch of the Ashikaga clan, was appointed as the governor of the family. However, in this way, the Ono Shiro clan, as well as the Osaki clan of Mutsu Kingdom and the top clan of Izumi Kingdom (both of which are of Spo clan origin), will not do it, so why let people with foreign surnames ride on their heads? The split between the Wuwei and Kingo families in the "Three Pipe Lords" made the Hosokawa Kyosho family de facto monopolize the power of the management lords.
Yamamyo Munjo
However, during this period, there was a rift in the relationship between Hosokawa Katsumoto and his father-in-law Yamana Munakata, because the Akamatsu clan's Shuyu wanted to revive the family, that is, to retake the old Akamatsu clan under Hosokawa Katsumoto's father-in-law, Yamana clan, and Hosokawa Seiyuki, the guardian of the Hosokawa clan's Shuyu Awa family, sided with the Akamatsu family, causing Yamana's dissatisfaction.
In fact, this can not blame Hosokawa Katsumoto, because the hosokawa Kyosho family and the Yamana clan after the alliance of the power is too strong, aroused the vigilance of the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa, Ashikaga Yoshimasa by raising the status of the Awa guardian family to balance the Hosokawa Kyosho family, resulting in the Awa guardian family often opposed to the general leader, listening to the tune and not listening to the announcement. In addition, in order to suppress the power of the guardian family, the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa and the deacon Ise Sadahito, ignored the protests of the Spo family's retainers and the Yamanaya clan (Yamamyo clan had a marriage contract with Spo Yoshinori), deposed Spo Yoshinori as the governor of the house, and recalled the exiled Spo Yoshitoshi back to the Takee family. At the same time, Ashikaga Yoshimasa and Ise Masamune pardoned Ōuchi Masahiro, who had fought with Hosokawa Katsumoto for supremacy over the Iyo kingdom, making it clear that the attitude was to suppress the Hosokawa and Yamana clans.
In September of the first year of The Bunkasa era (1466), Hosokawa Katsumoto and Yamana Muneyoshi staged a coup d'état, and Ashikaga Yoshinori, the younger brother of Ashikaga Yoshimasa, who supported Ashikaga Yoshimasa, regarded him as the lord and exiled Ise Sadahito. Unlike in the general theory, Yamana Muneyoshi was a staunch supporter of Ashikaga Yoshishi from beginning to end, and he desperately hoped that Ashikaga Yoshishi would become a shogun and raise the status of a famous Takayama family, but Hosokawa Katsumoto reinstated the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa after exiled Ise, which ran counter to Yamana's plan and caused dissatisfaction among the Yamana clan.
In December, Yamana Mune allied with Hatayama Yoshinori, who dominated the Yamato and Hanoi kingdoms, and called on Hatoyama Yoshinobu to go to Luo. In the first month of the following year (bunsho 2nd year, 1467), Hatoyama Yoshinobu and hatoyama Yoshinori fought a war with the then-governor Hatoyama at the Imperial Shrine in Kyoto, and Ashikaga Yoshimasa knew that Hatoyama Yoshinori and Hatoyama's supporters were Yamana Muneyoshi and Hosokawa Katsumoto, and in order to avoid the guardian daimyo getting involved in civil unrest, the shogunate ordered that no daimyo should interfere in the war of the Hatoyama family.
Tomoko Hino, Masamasa Ashikaga
Hosokawa Katsumoto obeyed the shogunate's orders very honestly, but Yamana Muneyoshi was different, and he sent his son-in-law, The Great General Takaaki Asakura, to the Goseon Shrine to support Hatoyama Yoshinori. Although Hatoyama defeated Hatoyama before reinforcements arrived, Yamana's practice of supporting his allies in defiance of shogunate orders was in stark contrast to Hosokawa Katsumoto's death, leading to Hosokawa Katsumoto being ridiculed by the rest of the world as a "coward who betrayed his allies" after the Battle of mirin. As mentioned earlier, Hosokawa Katsumoto was a noble prince born with a golden key, under the protection of his uncle, from childhood to adulthood, all the way smoothly, where he suffered such grievances, he naturally could not bear the insult, and decided to launch revenge.
In March, the imperial court considered the era name "Wenzheng" to be a coup d'état and a civil war, which was not very auspicious, so it ordered the change of the yuan "Yingren", and as a result, only two months after the change of the yuan, there was a greater war in Japan - which was called the "Yingren Civilization Rebellion" at the beginning of the Sengoku period in Japan.
In May, Hosokawa Katsumoto formed an alliance with the daimyōs of Hatoyama, Yoshitoshi Shiro, and Masanori Akamatsu, and sent troops to surround the shogun's imperial residence, the "Hana No Miyakata", moved the emperor to the imperial palace, took control of the shogunate and the emperor, and then launched a counterattack against Yamana Muneyoshi, Hatayama Yoshinori, and Spo Yoshinori, and the Onin Rebellion broke out. Since Hosokawa Katsumoto's main front was to the east of Kyoto, and Yamana's home front was to the west, the two armies were also known as the Eastern Army and the Western Army.
YingRen's Rebellion Force Chart
In the early days of the Yingren Rebellion, Yamana Zongquan was caught off guard and was defeated by the Eastern Army. Fortunately, after entering August, Ōuchi Masahiro, who was opposed to the Hosokawa Kyoshiro family, led the army of Shangluo to join the Western Army, turning the tide of the war in one fell swoop. The Ouchi clan held the guardianship of the four kingdoms of Zhoufangguo, Nagato Kingdom, Toyomae Kingdom, and Chikuzen Kingdom, and had a powerful power in Kitakyushu and the western part of the Seto Inland Sea, and for many years competed with the Hosokawa Kyoshiro family for the "right to survey trade" with the Ming Dynasty and the hegemony of the Seto Inland Sea.
Compared to the fierce general Yamana Munakata, Hosokawa Katsumoto is longer than the strategy and trickery. In order to attack the power of the Western Army, Hosokawa Katsumoto reused the rogue Bone Skin Michiken under the command of the Shiro Takugawa Takatashi, and appointed him as a foot light general, leading a group of rogues and citizens to harass and fight near the western army positions. In the first year of civilization (1469), Hosokawa Katsumoto bribed Yamana's second son, Yamana Masamune, the second son of Yamana Zongquan, to take the Settsu Kingdom to cut off the supply route of the Ouchi army, and then continuously transferred the yamana clan's vassals in an attempt to disintegrate the Yamana clan's domain. Subsequently, Hosokawa Katsumoto instigated the Ouchi clan of the Ouchi clan to start a civil war in the territory of the Ouchi clan, and disrupted the base area of the Ouchi Army.
The Rebellion of Ying Ren
Not only that, in the third year of the civilization (1471), Hosokawa Katsumoto transferred the Western army general Asakura Takaaki to fight in the Echizen Kingdom under the condition of his position as the guardian of the Echizen Kingdom. Hyogotsu in the Settsu Kingdom and Wakasa Bay in the Echizen Kingdom were both the lifeblood of the Western Army's supply line, and these two areas fell into the hands of the Eastern Army, giving the Eastern Army the upper hand in the Onin Rebellion and ultimately winning.
However, years of war and conspiracy gradually dragged down Hosokawa Katsumoto's body. In March of the fifth year of civilization (1473), the elderly Yamana Muneyoshi died of illness in the face of internal and external troubles, and two months later Hosokawa Katsumoto died in the footsteps of his father-in-law, at the age of forty-four. Although the Onin Rebellion continued at the time of Hosokawa Katsumoto's death, the Eastern Army had already laid the foundation for victory thanks to Hosokawa Katsumoto's schemes.
After Hosokawa Katsumoto's death, hosokawa Kyoshiro's family was succeeded by Hosokawa Katsumoto's concubine Smart Maru (Hosokawa Masamoto), so under the leadership of Hosokawa Masamoto, where will the direction of the Onin Rebellion and the future of the Hosokawa Kyoshiro family go?
Text author: Sanae Hojo
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