From the Medieval Period to the Early Modern Period Hideyoshi no bui, Nobunaga no bui (The Military Prestige of Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Oda Nobunaga: How Rulers Force People into Submission)

In Japan, the period from the 1570s to 1590s was a time when a society divided by the turmoil of the Sengoku period was unified by the hegemons Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi. In Kyoto, Nobunaga and then Hideyoshi became hegemon and sought to unify the provinces, where Sengoku daimyō, who were local military leaders, held sway. Japan would be “unified” only when they were all brought under the control of the central authorities. But it took time for Nobunaga and Hideyoshi, who had only recently appeared on the scene, to make them submit to their rule, and subjugating them by force of arms would have entailed the squandering of vast amounts of money. Nobunaga and Hideyoshi were faced with a major problem: how to make the Sengoku daimyō obediently submit to them?
 
This book considers the diplomatic bargaining that took place between the hegemons and the daimyō, with “military prestige” as a keyword. “Military prestige” does not refer to military power per se, and it encompasses the influence exerted by someone possessing military power as they seek the allegiance of others. By deciphering contemporary documents, I examine the way in which the hegemons placed emphasis on their own “military prestige” and forced provincial daimyō into submission. At times they spoke of unbelievably enormous military prestige, stressed that they deserved the credit for the state of peace without war that followed the daimyō’s submission, and boasted of being outstanding statesmen of a warrior government. It becomes apparent that the hegemons worked assiduously on their propaganda, in which fact mingled with fiction.
 
National unification during this period is often associated with images of hegemons swallowing up the provinces by means of their overwhelming military might. But behind the deployment of force on a large scale moves were also definitely made to emphasize their military prestige in attempts to gain the submission of others. These struggles between the hegemons and daimyō are another intriguing phenomenon distinctive of this period.
 

(Written by KUROSHIMA Satoru, Associate Professor, Historiographical Institute / 2019)