The Muromachi Period is a timeline in Japanese history of approximately two hundred and fifty years that ran from roughly 1336 to 1573. This period began when the Japanese government led emperor Go-Daigo failed to establish a dominant empire when imperial powers were restored. The wealthy landowners believed that they should have a firm hand in the government and they were upset by the emperor’s lack of consideration to them and some poor choices in ruling the country.

This series of events led to the emperor’s ruin as his empire fell and Japan was ruled by the first Muromachi shogun, Ashikaga Takauji. While Takauji had once fought on behalf of the emperor, he now challenged the imperial court and captured Kyoto in 1336 and officially declared himself shogun two years later. However, this was not a complete victory as the emperor established a secondary court in the south. For approximately fifty years the Northern and Southern courts fought against each other.

The two battling sides eventually came together when the Southern court conceded to the Northern court in 1392, officially reuniting Japan under one ruling empire. During the early 1400’s of the Muromachi period under the rule of Ashikaga Yoshimitsu the Japanese government established contact with China, who was in the midst of the Ming Dynasty, and that relationship was to last for close to fifty years. It was during this time that Japan and China participated in the trading of items like sulphur, swords, silk, and books. Because of this trade and the acceptance of Zen Buddhism, the arts were encouraged and even flourished. The burgeoning economy caused a new kind of township and social classes to develop in Japan.

In 1467 the Onin War began. The Onin war was a period of civil unrest in Japan in which many different lords vied for complete control of the country, but the central conflict was between Hosokawa Katsumoto and Yamana S?zen. By the fall of that year the northern section of Kyoto was in complete ruin. Almost all of its citizenry had fled, leaving the once proud city almost entirely vacant except for those who stayed on to fight and those who were too desperate to do anything other than loot the remains of the Kyoto. Even when Hosokawa Katsumoto and Yamana S?zen died five years later, the fighting did not stop.

This conflict led to political disintegration within the imperial court. Because of the land owners who imposed feudal control on their property the reliance on the central government vanished. This landowner control led to peasants rising up against their landlords and the particularly harsh and unfavorable conditions in which they worked and lived. The war touched nearly every corner of the country, and the government ruled by Ashikaga Yoshimasa did not take an active rule in dispersing the fighting. It has even been said that Yoshimasa felt his time too important to spend in the matters of war and would retreat into the confines of his temple to write and recite poetry.

The Onin War lasted until 1477, and afterward the government was left bankrupt and the countrymen were rebellious. Another clan, the Hatakeyama, had fractioned into two separate parts that had waged battles against each other until they were at a complete standstill with neither side winning. In 1485 in response to this conflict, there was a revolt by some of the peasants and samurai which led to the establishment of an individual army known as the Ikki-ikko. This armed uprising was far more organized than a mere rebellion and the Ikki-ikko established themselves in several communities throughout Japan and even managed to overthrow some of the warlords to establish their own sort of government in the Kaga Province where they managed to build their headquarters along the Yodo River.

The rule of the government by the Ashikaga quietly crumbled as the Hosokawa family vied for the behind the scenes control. This hollow government system set up Japan for a series of conflicts and wars as various entities waged battles to put their favorite shogun in power so that they could more easily pull the strings. Despite these constant conflicts, the Hosokawa family would stay in control until the mid 1500’s, but by then it did not truly matter as the constant warring that had been waged throughout Japan had caused quite a toll to be taken on the people and the country. So much of the warlords’ control were weakened that the government turned to a more military based control under Oda Nobunaga when he unified Japan by throwing over the bakufu in 1573.

While the civil wars did a lot to undermine the rule of the Ashikaga and cause major problems amongst the citizens of the country, it did stimulate the economy because of all the transportation required to move the supplies and armies across the country. Such growth in the merchandising sector led to improvements in the protection of the different trades. The influence of the Western culture at the end of the Muromachi period only helped to increase this establishment of trade. This influx of cultures began with the Portuguese in 1543, when the Japanese were first introduced to Western cultures ideals in religion and weapons. While many of the Buddhists in Japan opposed the idea of Christianity coming into their country, some of the land owners welcomed it because they wanted to establish a trade route with many of the foreign nations and saw this influx of Christian missionaries as a way to go about doing this.

Later, the Spanish and Dutch came in shortly after the end of the Muromachi period. This change brought with it an entirely different outlook by the Japanese toward Western culture and government. And it would not be long before the growing popularity of churches and Christian converts would cause the rest of the country to become more unified against the new religion, causing Christian persecutions to begin barely thirty years after the end of the Muromachi Period.