You learned how to play go while reading Hikaru no go without your noticing but perhaps you you didn't realize yet you know a little the history of Japan thanks to Sai and Torajiro.
We create this section to help you to supplement your knowledge. Becoming more erudite than Hikaru in History is from now on within your reach !

Hello ! Konnichiwa !!!

I am professor Sai! What?! No no! You are not in the wrong section! You really are in history of Japan's section.

I admit that I am not an historian but the best go player of all times! How is that I am not modest?! But what I say is only the truth!

Well, let's get back to the subject, history of Japan. As you know, I not only excel in playing go but in history too. Hikaru can confirm you this. Thanks to me, his marks get better since I help him. But I must tell that I do not desserve credit for knowing Japan history. To exist since one thousand years and to be in the world og linvings twice can give the possibility of learning history of Japan.

So let's begin. I will not give you long and long explanations on the subject. Some opponents are waiting for me. So, I will only dwell on periods named in the manga as well as the ones I lived in.

Ah, Heian Era! The best for me, even if I suffered a lot! The period in which I truly lived.

The historians are unanimous. This era is considered as classical Japan. Historians study this period many times.

Generations of poets, painters and art historian transform this era into a kind of golden age, quintessence of national spirit, an ideal time in which men are only occupied by calligraphy, litterature and other refined arts. The Heian era is the outcome of chinese and japanese's cultures acculturation. It is an ideal time for women whom played an important role as the creation of hiragana system.

Other example of this role is the masterpiece of litterature, Genji Monogatori written by Murasaki Shikibu.

Elsewhere in Japan, the culture is still unsophisticated and the fact of being exiled in province is considered as death. But in the court, the refinement is at is peak. Contrary to chinese government system, Japan distances itself gradually. For example, it does not exist exams system in order to be a government official and hold high responsibilities near the Emperor. In fact Japan has a feudal system that is established by old clans who has won their authority back..

The most powerful clan is mine, the Fujiwara. Around 950, my clan seizes the power, limiting Emperors' one to a purely representative role. My family is present in all scales of the power. The little government official to the ministers. How do they come to this result? By a simple way. Every generation, the leader of our clan marries one of several daughter to the Emperor. As father in law or grandfather of a minor heir, he exerts a real regency permanently. When the Emperor is adult he forces him to abdicate his responsibility after having choosing his still child successor. In addition, he makes sure to place his next of kins at important positions of the government and to grant his protection to the provincial nobility.

This can ensure the country to live in an apparent peace. This can ensure the art and literature development. Ah, I remember the conversations, the delicate poems going with flowers or branches in blossom, showing untold feelings. I remember the stacking kimono up with taste and grace, the white complexion, the lips reddened by make up and the blackened teeth for reaching the height of the Beauty. I remember the looks hidden by shutters, the fans that conceal the women's faces from men's look.

I lived in this era. I died in it.

Afterwards, I learn that my family is weakened. Members of Fujiwara's clan become divided They fight each other in order to get positions of government and titles deprived of meaning. From this private fights, feudal revolts increase. Many times, monks-warriors besiege the capital. The court can not restore law and order. So it calls Taira and Minamoto's clans. In addition, in 1094 the Emperor Go-Sanjô who is not affiliated to Fujiwara's family creates the insei system, (retiring Emperor), establishing an unofficial administration that will continue during three centuries

In the second half of the XIIth century Japan goes under a civil war. Three families are fighting, Fujiwara, Minamoto and Taira. My clan is eliminated for good in 1060. Taira takes power...

I have not 'lived' during this Era. But it is alluded in the manga by the little act calle the Honno-ji's fire. The action takes place into a dark period of Japan history. It's the warring states periods called sengoku jidai (refer to the Warring states in China few centuries before). The country is in the grip of Daimyo's (lords) hunger for conquering territories. This period continues while the first contacts with westerners start.

In 1568, by the fighting chances, a little and from humble extraction, Oda Nobunaga, becomes the most powerful lord of Japan because of the judicious use of firearms. He succeeds in defeating powerful opponents and in making a name for himself in Kyôtô and in being appointed as shôgun. In few years, he manages to reorganise the central provinces by bringing more and more vassals together. Then he becomes the master of most part of Japan.

Yet, he was an intransigent and cruel man. He makes an enemy of lot of people and among them Akechi Mitsuhide who betrays him and forced him to kill himself (seppuku) in the Honno temple. Akechi becomes the new shôgun but this title will be abducted by one of Nobunaga's generals : Toyatomi Hideyoshi who will reunify the country.

To Hideyoshi's death, and after Sekigahara's battle, another Nobunaga's general will be appointed as shôgun , Tokugawa Ieyasu who will establish a shogunate dynasty.

When I come back in the world of livings in Shusaku's body, Japan still has a strict and unchanging feudal system. Japan is governed by Tokugawa's family and it is divided in three classes : noblemen and warriors, farming and the last traders. It is a peaceful era, but revolts occur more and more often.

The peace being a fact, the daimyo start being idle and are forced to stay at Edo a part of the year and their families are taken in hostage when they are not at Edo. The poorest warriors find themselves without lord and become a scourge for the shogunate, because those ronins become brigands.

In addition, the country knows important financial difficulties generated by the famines that occur often. From 1841 to 1843, Mizuno Tadakini tries to reform the country. His propositions to fight the poverty and revolts go by detailed regulations on everyday life as a close watch of customs, the censorship and he extols the virtues of the free competition between traders. He also proposes to reunite all the shogunate's territories in the surroundings of Osaka and Edo. He will be dismissed because he does not obtain the expecting results.

But, although my country was so fixed, the beginnings of a change could be felt. And the change comes from the outside. Japan is closed to the foreigners since 1639, excepting for a little island called Dejima on which Dutchmen could live. In 1804, Russians and others westerners tries to establish commercial relations with us. The Dutch government even asks the shogunate to break out his isolation politic.

In 1853, Commodore Perry drops in the Bay of Uraga and asks for the opening of Japan. The Bakufu is afraid by the armed ships and accepts to open two harbors in 1854. It is Shimoda and Hakodate. The bakufu signs several treaties with several foreign governments.

A part of the country protested against the barbarians, aiming at the shogunate and strives for the imperial authority's return at the same time. The tensions are more than tenser and in 1868 a new civil war occurs. The government changes and Japan comes into Modernity.