Episode 144: On the Edge

March 1, 2026 Joshua Badgley

The waters at Kofunakoshi all the way out in Tsushima. This is where boats from the continent would anchor while they transhipped goods across to the other side of the island to then make its way to the Dazai and then on to Yamato, proper. Photo by author.

Tsukushi Dazai (筑紫太宰)

The Yamato government’s outpost on Tsukushi, aka Kyūshū. Also known as the Ōmikotomochi. The head of the Dazai was perhaps the most powerful individual outside of the Yamato court. They were largely autonomous, and had authority over a large area, as well as all of the trade and diplomatic missions to and from the archipelago. They also had a tremendous military presence, especially since the fall of Baekje. They were responsible for ensuring that all of the castles built in the end of the 7th century were likewise manned.

Kibi Dazai (吉備太宰)

The Kibi Dazai is only mentioned once in the Nihon Shoki, but from what we can tell it was set up as part of the Taika reforms and oversaw Kibi and Harima. It may have had some prestige at the time, but it never had the diplomatic or military responsibilities that the Tsukushi Dazai had, and eventually it would be dismantled, as Kibi was divided into the provinces of Bizen, Bitchū, and Bingo.

Settsu-shiki no Daibu (攝津職大夫)

The Settsu-shiki was the office in Settsu that operated in lieu of the kokushi, or government office. The Daibu position had more expansive powers than your typical governor, and also oversaw Naniwa. This was technically one of the Home Provinces, but still demonstrates the complexity of administration beyond the court itself.

Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan. My name is Joshua, and this is episode 144: On the Edge
The ships sat low in the water, bobbing gently against the docks at Naniwa. The captain eyed them warily as the officials went over the manifest. The Seto Inland Sea was generally calm and smooth sailing—at least compared to the open ocean, anywhere else -- and yet, as he looked, he could only think of how sluggish these ships would be. They were laden down with cargo—silk, cloth, thread, and of course provisions for the men accompanying them. But more than that, they were laden down with iron. Tons of iron ingots, destined for the far reaches of the archipelago. First to Suwa, but then on to the Dazai on Tsukushi, no doubt to be forged into weapons for the defense of Yamato.
But that wasn’t the captain’s concern. He just needed to make sure that the ships weren’t weighed down too much: as long as they remained buoyant, they would make the journey, even if they had to travel at a snail’s pace to do it. But if the ships sat too low in the water, then all it would take was some uncooperative waves and the ships, crew, and cargo, would be sent straight down to the palace of the dragon king, beneath the waves.
Fortunately, with enough ships, it looked like that wouldn’t be too much of a problem, as long as the goods were properly spaced out. Now to just hope that the weather cooperated. Even in the relatively safe waters of the Seto Inland Sea, you never know what could happen…

So last episode we talked about two large projects that Ohoama is said to have started. First was the history project, which likely led to the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki. Second was the start of a brand new capital. This episode, we are going from the macro, down to the micro—smaller events that just weren’t covered in previous episodes. For the most part the next few episodes are going to be a grab bag of various items, but I’m going to try and put some semblance of cohesion to this. Next episode we’ll be looking at some of the laws that they made, including the law code and examples of the kinds of punishment—and forgiveness—that the court could bestow. This week, however, we are going to cover a bunch of stories focused on the areas outside of the Home Provinces. We’ll look at the Dazai in Tsukushi—and elsewhere. We’ll talk about how the provinces were governed, and what concerned them. Granted, a lot of what concerned them, at least from the Chroniclers point of view, were taxes and economic production. So we see recorded concern with taxes and with what was there—the land and the people that worked it. Also with natural events, like droughts and tsunami, which would affect that same economic production.

We’re starting off with the Dazai, and the person in charge there. The Viceroy, as it is often called in English.
The Dazai appears to have started off with something of a military purpose. It was a gathering place before ships would sail off to the Korean peninsula, raiding up the rivers, or trading with their allies. As the archipelago began to be more embroiled in the wars of the peninsula, it was that much more important. And when Yamato’s ally, Baekje, fell, and it looked like Silla and the Great Tang might turn their attention to the islands that had been a thorn in their side for so long, it became a bulwark against potential invasion.
However, it also had another function. It was the jumping off place for warships, but also for embassies and trading missions. It was also the primary destination for most ships approaching Yamato. They would take a route through Tsushima island, and then Iki island, and continue to the main coast of Tsukushi—Kyushu, and up and around to the sheltered waters of Hakata bay. At some point they would even move that initial contact farther out, to Tsushima island itself. Ships would dock on one side of the island, and transport their goods to a Yamato ship on the other side, with a pilot who knew the waters. The local island officials could then send word ahead to the Dazai that they were coming. No surprises, and nobody jumping the gun thinking that a fleet of warships was on their way.
The Dazai played a key role in defense, trade, and diplomacy. When the embassies arrived, they were entertained at the Dazai while word was sent to the court. If the court deemed it appropriate, then they might have the ambassadors take the journey the rest of the way. Otherwise, the court at the Dazai would stand in for the sovereign, and receive the messages, and various diplomatic gifts that were sent along.
This was a powerful and also highly lucrative position, and it is reflected in the people who were granted the title. This was the Dazai no Sochi, or Oho-mikoto-mochi no kami.
We see the post held by Soga no Himuka in 649, during the Taika era. Then we see Abe no Hirafu in the reign of Takara Hime, 655-661. Hirafu would go on to become the Minister of the Left. Then we see Prince Kurikuma.
We talked about Prince Kurikuma before—he was Ohoama’s ally in Tsukushi who refused the Afumi court’s request for troops during the Jinshin no Ran. He is one of the few figures that we have more than just a bit of information on. For one thing, we have two different appointments to his position as viceroy in Tsukushi—there is one in 668, and another in 671, with Soga no Akae being given the post in between. There are some questions about whether or not those were different people—the first one might have been someone named “Kurisaki” or “Kurimae”, but it is generally assumed that was just misspelled, and it may be that there were just some questions as to when he was appointed. We also know that he was a friend to Ohoama. The Afumi court said as much, and in the Jinshin no Ran, when he and his sons stood up to the Afumi court’s request for troops, he came down heavily on Ohoama’s side. It is no wonder that he would have still been in such a powerful position.
His sons, by the way, are named as Prince Mino and Prince Takebe; we’ve seen what appears to be different Princes named Mino, but it is possible that this is the Prince Mino mentioned elsewhere in this part of the record.
Sources suggest that Kurikuma was a descendant of the sovereign Nunakura, aka Bidatsu Tennou, and that he was an ancestor of the Tachibana clan. There were stories about him in Tsukushi, beyond those in the Nihon Shoki, and while he isn’t always named explicitly, one can infer that he hosted a number of embassies and ambassadors in his time. In fact, in his position as head of the Dazaifu in Tsukushi, he was in what was perhaps the most lucrative post outside of Yamato. In addition to being in charge of trade, diplomacy, and military readiness, the Dazaifu oversaw all of Tsukushi—the island of Kyushu, and was like a miniature representation of the central government.
I suspect it is the military responsibilities that saw Kurikuma being appointed to the post of Director of Military Affairs—Tsuwamo-no-Tsukasa-no-Kami, or Heiseikan-cho. That was in the 3rd lunar month of 675, just a few years into Ohoama’s reign.
This would later be known as the Hyoubu-shou, or Ministry of War. The appointment would not last long, however. A year later, Kurikuma would pass away from disease.
Prince Kurikuma is one of those enigmatic and yet somewhat exciting individuals that exists beyond just the Nihon Shoki.   The Shoku Nihongi and later sources give us additional details, which may or may not be accurate. Even moreso, there are stories in modern Nagasaki prefecture about Prince Kurikuma helping to regulate the animals that lived in the waters surrounding Kyushu. According to the Shoku Nihongi record, he was reportedly granted the 2nd princely rank upon his death—which, if true, would seem to say a lot about how he was viewed at the time.
Moving into the year 676, we see an edict that restricted governorships to individuals of the rank of Daisen and below. The exceptions to this were the Home Provinces, Michinoku, and Nagato, and let’s explore why these areas were excepted.
Home Provinces make sense, as that is where the capital is and this more prestigious area was therefore deserving of a higher ranked noble. Michinoku was the opposite geographically: it was the general wilderness of Tohoku, and the land of the Emishi. It was also the farthest east of the capital, so I suspect they wanted someone of rank to handle that.
The governor of Nagato, however, is interesting. Nagato is part of Honshu, the main island, just north of Kyushu, across the Shimonoseki strait. Similar to Michinoku, Nagato was one of the most remote provinces on Honshu. It was also an important province for potential defense and trade, and often coordinated with the Dazaifu in Tsukushi, to the south. As such, it was also considered a more prominent posting than other governorships.
It is somewhat interesting that the Dazaifu is not mentioned, but I suspect this is because the head of the Dazaifu was not, in fact, a governor, but more akin to a viceroy. After all, they had to be entrusted with a certain amount of authority to be able to conduct military, trade, and diplomatic business without constantly sending back to the Yamato court for instruction. We’ve already seen that there were Princes and other men of wealth and status who had been given that posting.
Interestingly, in this reign we see at least one other viceroy—one other Dazai, or Ohomikotomochi—and that is in Kibi, of all places. From what we can tell Kibi was one of the main rivals for power and authority in the prior centuries. It has come up again and again in the stories. Unfortunately, most of the stories only hint at what we think actually happened. Today, when we talk about the Dazaifu we are almost exclusively talking about the one in Kyushu. Besides being far flung from the center of power, it had huge responsibilities.
Comparatively, though perhaps not as directly involved with trade, the rulers of Kibi were important figures, as demonstrated by the amount of manpower they were able to leverage for building their large, kingly tombs. We talked somewhat about that back in Episode 48, looking at Tsukuriyama Kofun, one of the largest in the archipelago. Furthermore, Kibi was well-placed on the Seto inland sea to be able to control the passage of ships. The Kibi Dazai appears to have been established around the time of the Taika reforms, though it is only mentioned once in the Nihon Shoki, and I don’t see any other examples of it. There is also evidence that it was given authority over not just Kibi, but also the neighboring province of Harima. Eventually, however, Kibi would be broken up into the three provinces of Bizen, Bitchu, and Bingo, and it would no longer need to be aggregated under a single administration. Rather, each province would get its own governor, overseeing a much smaller part of the whole. From this I can only assume that there may have been other, similar situations, prior to the various provinces being broken up like that.
A couple months later, in the 5th month of 676, we are once again discussing governors. First was a decree about governors who weren’t paying their commuted taxes on time. Aston goes on to note that non-rice taxes were due in the middle of the 8th month—at least for the home provinces. Near provinces—a little farther away—taxes had to be received by the end of the 10th month, and for those a bit farther away—in the middle distance—they had to be there by the 11th month. Finally, the taxes from the farthest provinces were due by the end of the 12th month. This would have given officials time to collect the taxes and to transport them all the way to the capital. So when the chronicles talk about governors not paying on time, not keeping to this schedule may have been what the court was getting at—or at least some kind of similar schedule with deadlines, since it might have been modified over time.

Another record, that same month—actually a few days later—concerns specifically the governor of Shimotsukenu—or Shimotsuke, on the other side of Honshu. He sent in a report that that province had been hit pretty hard that year with a poor harvest. In fact, it was so bad that many peasants were seeking permission to sell their children. The court ultimately denied the request, but this does speak to a rather disturbing—yet not exactly uncommon—cultural practice. I don’t think we need to get into the different nuances here, beyond a look at the fact that this was likely not a new practice, but it does seem that the appeal to the government for permission to sell one’s children was something new. Perhaps this came with all of the records and registrations that the government had undertaken to know who was in what household. Regardless, one can hardly imagine that most parents would willingly take this option unless they had no other choice, and I suspect that it is meant to show both the desperation of the people in Shimotsuke, as well as the harsh benevolence of the sovereign, who would not permit the children to be separated from their families.
Of course, we aren’t told how the court otherwise ameliorated the situation, since moral righteousness is tremendous, but doesn’t suddenly fix the problems with the harvest or cause food to appear out of nowhere. One hopes that the court at least sent some amount of rice or other provisions to help the people.
Although it was Shimotsuke in the 5th month, in the 6th month we see a more general report of a large drought. Messengers were sent throughout the land to get people to donate cloth, and make prayers to the kami, while Buddhist Priests called upon the power of the Three Precious Things. It was all to no avail—the usual rains didn’t come, so the wugu, the five grains didn’t grow, and peasants starved. The five grains per se are rice, soybeans, wheat, and two types of millet, but in this case the term is just a stand-in for all types of agricultural produce.
Possibly unrelated, but somewhat telling, two months later we see a record of the court granting sustenance-fiefs of all Royal princes and princesses down to the high ministers and female officials at the palace down to the rank of Shoukin. So only two months after the peasants of Yamato were apparently starving, the court is handing out stipend increases to the elite. So… yeah….
We do see a focus in the 8th month on an Oho-barai, or Great Purification. I’m going to talk about this more in a future episode, though, so just noting here that they seem to have been working to purify the land and that may have been part of ongoing spiritual attempts to request the support of the kami in what appear to be difficult times. There were also plenty of examples of attempts to make merit by demonstrating righteousness and reading various sutras.
Moving on to the events of 677, things seem to have been going better than the previous year, so maybe all that merit-making had an effect? Either way, we don’t see any mention of droughts or famines this year, and we make it to the ninth month, when we see a notice that any vagabonds who returned after being sent back to their hometown would be set to forced labor. Vagabond, in this case, is “furounin”, or “person who floats on the waves”. This appears to be the origin of the term “Rounin”, which would later refer to masterless samurai. At this point it seems to refer mostly to commoners who were expected to work the land—and when workers abandoned the land that had implications for the government’s tax base system. So the State was invested in ensuring that people didn’t just move somewhere else—at least without asking permission and being properly registered. This does seem different from an actual fugitive, such as someone who was banished who tries to leave their place of banishment.
The following month, the 10th month of 677, we see that Kawabe no Omi no Momoye was appointed head of the Minbukyo, the Minister of the Interior. In addition, Tajihi no Kimi no Maro was made a Daibu, or high official, of the province of Settsu.     The term “daibu” could just refer to high ministers of the court, but the “daibu” of a province appears to be similar to a governor, but with more expansive and comprehensive authority. Settsu is one of the five home provinces, and as such an important part of the geographical heart of Yamato.   So we have the local chieftains, the governors, the viceroys at the Dazai, and also, apparently, a “high official” in some regions, each with what appear to be overlapping but slightly different portfolios.
The next month we see that the Viceroy of Tsukushi—whoever had taken the place of Prince Yagaki—had his officials present a red crow to the court. The person who caught the crow was granted five steps in rank—not a small reward. Also, local officials had their own rank raised, and taxes were remitted to the peasants of that district for a year. Finally, a general amnesty was announced across Yamato.
We talked in Episode 141 how something like a red crow would have likely represented either the three-legged crow in the sun or the legendary Suzaku, the fiery bird of the south. Either way, it was clearly an auspicious discovery. It is interesting that we don’t see any names at all associated with this event. We do, however, see that people were no doubt incentivized to report such things up to the court. Whoever found such a curiosity would likely have been celebrated by all of those around given the court’s broad show of appreciation. No doubt the local officials were more than pleased given that they were also likely to receive some of the benefits that accrued if the court was well pleased.
As far as the type of events I’m focusing on this episode, there isn’t much recorded between the red crow of 677 and a few years later in 682. Picking up in the 3rd month of that year, we get a record of the Emishi of Michinoku being granted court rank, incorporating them further into the growing Yamato polity. As I talked about a little earlier, Michinoku on the other side of the archipelago, so this event really shows expansion of Yamato and solidification of its power over the rest of Honshu. It is easy to forget that much of the Tohoku region was not firmly under Yamato control at this time. They may have claimed it, but the people and culture there were still considered distinct and not a part of Yamato, proper. But they were making inroads.
In the following month, the 4th lunar month of the same year, 682, we are back on the west coast and see Tajihi no Mabito no Shima as the latest Viceroy of Tsukushi, sending as tribute a large bell. It is somewhat interesting that, compared to the past few viceroys, Shima is actually a member of a noble family and not a Prince. Of course, there was no requirement that the Dazaifu be overseen by a Prince—that certainly wasn’t the case for Soga no Akaye, but it is interesting given how Ohoama had been making appointments, so far. Even if they weren’t princely, it is clear that this was an important posting, which says a lot for Tajihi no Shima, even if we didn’t know anything more about him.
Fortunately, there are a few clues. For one thing, there are records that claim he was descended from one of the previous sovereigns, but he did not hold the title of “Prince”. That is reflected in his family’s kabane of “Mabito”, however, or “True person”, which seems to indicate at least a nominal descent from a previous ruler. Shima would continue to rise in the government, and would eventually serve as the Minister of the Right and then Minister of the Left, and at one point he would be the highest ranking noble in the government—though that was still a ways off. All of this speaks to the importance of the position of viceroy, and probably gives us a clue as to why the Chroniclers were so interested in someone sending a bell, large as it might be, to the government.
A day after the bell tribute arrived, Emishi of Koshi, including Ikokina and others, requested 70 households of prisoners of war to create a new district. While we’ve talked about the Emishi of Koshi, before, what is particularly interesting is the request for prisoners of war—captives. Were these Wajin, or Japanese, who had been captured by the Emishi and they were requesting permission to resettle them? Were they asking for 70 households of people being held captive by the Yamato government? It isn’t clear. It also isn’t clear if “Ikokina” is the name of an individual or of multiple individuals. Aston originally translated it as Itaka, Kina, and others, while Bentley’s more recent translation suggests it is one name. However, given that this is an Emishi name, being transliterated in Kanji through a Japanese translator, it is hard to know without further sources.
From the fourth month to the 7th month of 682, we see a small entry that presents were given to men from Tanegashima, Yakushima, and Amami no Shima. This simple entry is important mostly just because of its mention of continued contact with these islands south of Kyushu. This helps us maintain some idea of the extent of Yamato’s influence.
In the late summer of 683, we once again see a drought. It began in the 7th lunar month and lasted until the 8th. A priest named Douzou prayed for rain and eventually obtained it. Douzou is said to have been a monk from Kudara, or Baekje. Aston suggests that this means he was a priest of Kudaradera, but it isn’t really clear to me.
In the early 8th month, we also see that there was a general amnesty ordered throughout Yamato, which I suspect was connected with the disaster of the drought and an attempt to help build merit and otherwise strengthen the state in the face of natural disaster and potential unrest.
At the end of 683, we see a survey team being sent out. The sovereign sent Prince Ise along with Hata no Kimi no Yakuni, Ohoshi no Omi no Homuchi, and Nakatomi no Muraji no Ohoshima with clerks and artisans to tour the realm and determine the border of the various provinces, but they were unable to determine them all in a year.
This really must have been quite the task. Certainly, the provinces were the ancient lands which people had been living in for some time, but there was never really a need for political lines on a map to determine where the boundaries were. People generally knew if they were in one or the other, and unless there was a very contentious piece of property, mostly you didn’t worry about which exact land or province you were in. Now, however, the court was in the midst of trying to lock down all of the data about the land, including what was where and how much there was. After all, their entire tax base was built on arable land, so they had to know where it was and what to expect. There is no way that such a project was going to be completed in a single year.
I would also note that Aston has this particular record misplaced. He seemed to think it was on the 23rd day of the month, but it is then followed by the 17th. It seems that Aston just got his dates wrong, and can you blame him? There was a lot that he was dealing with.
We do see, almost a year later, in the 10th month of 684, Prince Ise and others are once again sent to determine the boundaries of the provinces. Second time’s the charm, maybe? Evidently not, because we then see another mention in the 10th month of 685, where the court gave them gifts of robes and trousers as they headed back out to the Eastern Countries one more time.
In the 11th month of 684 we are given a small report of a huge disaster. The governor of Tosa reported that a great tide had risen high, with an overflowing rush, and destroyed many of the ships used to convey tribute.
Tosa is on Shikoku, facing out to the Pacific Ocean. It is the first piece of dry land just past the continental shelf. As such, a quake just off shore could create conditions not dissimilar to the 2011 disaster in Fukushima, and send a tsunami wave flooding the coastline. It looks like that is what happened, which would have devastated the fleet. Since Shikoku was an island, they relied on those ships to get taxes and tribute conveyed up to Yamato. So this was Tosa letting the court know that the “sea ate my homework.”
I can’t help but wonder if this tsunami wasn’t related to an earthquake recorded for the month earlier, which we mentioned back in Episode 139. It was a huge earthquake that seems to have had a tremdous impact. Much of it was mentioned as being focused on the Toukaidou region, but that region still lies along a related fault line all the way down through Shikoku. It may be that it took a while for the two events to be reported, and there may not have been an understanding that the event in one place could have had an impact elsewhere. I don’t know if they had yet connected that earthquakes could cause tsunami or not. On the other hand, it could be that it was a separate, but related quake, or even an aftershock, which caused the tsunami.
Overall, the year 684 does not appear to have been the best. We are told that in the lower district of Katsuraki, there was reported a chicken with four legs. Then, in the district of Higami, in Tanba province, there was a calf born with twelve horns. These don’t sound like great omens, and given the tsunami, and the earthquake, and other such things, I can perhaps understand why the court focused on trying to do some merit-making towards the end of the year. For instance they pardoned all criminals except those guilty of capital crimes.
And we are also told that Iga, Ise, Mino, and Wohari were notified that in future years, if they were paying commuted taxes—that is taxes other than rice, in lieu of service—that force labour would be remitted, and vice versa.   That is, if it was a year where they would pay in corvee labour, the commuted taxes would be remitted instead. In other words, they didn’t need to do both in one year. Similarly , in the 7th lunar month of 685, we are told that the Provinces on the Tousandou, east of Mino, and the Toukaidou, east of Ise, were all exempted from sending in conscript laborers as part of their taxes.
We aren’t told exactly why any of this was done, but I suspect that it had something to do with either construction going on in those regions, or just needing to have people to work the fields. Labor could always be remitted just because of something good like a good omen, but in the aftermath of a devastating earthquake, I wonder if there wasn’t a lot of rebuilding that had to take place, and maybe the court just wanted to make sure those regions had the people they needed for those projects.
The Tousandou and the Toukaidou were just two of the 7 official circuits around the archipelago. In this case, the Toukaidou hugged the coastal areas, heading from Ise out to modern Tokyo. Meanwhile, the Tousandou would have cut through the mountains in the middle of that area of Honshu, passing north of Fuji and through modern Gunma.    The other circuits were the San’youdou, the San’indou, the Nankaidou, the Hokurikudou, and Tsukushi, which was considered its own “circuit”. The San’youdou and San’indou were the Yang and Yin roads, going through the western part of Honshu. The San’youdou was along the Seto Inland Sea, while the San’indou was along the Japan sea. The Nankaidou, or South Sea Road, was the Kii peninsula and Shikoku. The Hokurikudou went north on eastern Honshu, through the Koshi region. Finally, Tsukushi, which would also be known as the Saikaidou, or Western Sea Road, was its own circuit
In the 9th lunar month of 685 we see Commissioners or Royal Messengers appointed to six of the seven circuits, the Hokurikudou being the one left out.    The commissioners were to tour and inspect the provincial and district offices and make sure they were good. Each person took a facility manager and a secretary to assist them. Bentley notes that there is, in later legal codes, a role of “Inspector”, who was similarly expected to tour and inspect the various provinces – but these were assigned on an as needed basis, so it wasn’t a permanent position.
Along with the inspection of the government offices, there was one other edict that same day in the 9th month of 685: the court ordered that male and female singers, as well as pipers/flute-players should pass down their skills to their descendants and make them practice singing and the flute. Thus they effectively created hereditary musicians which, at the time, was how you made sure that you had the different professions and skillsets you needed to run the State.
Then, in the 11th month of 685, we see a bunch of iron sent to the General Magistrate of Suwa. How much is a bunch? 10,000 kin, which is thought to be equivalent to roughly 6.6 tons. That is a huge amount of iron, assuming the record is true. At the same time, the viceroy of Tsukushi requested 100 bolts of coarse silk, 132 pounds of thread, 300 bundles of cloth, 4000 feet of labor tax cloth, 6.6 tons of iron, and 2,000 sets of bamboo arrows.   And by all accounts, the court sent it all out. No idea why—but there we go. Presumably it was to make things—probably clothing and weapons.
We see something similar in the 12th month, when the ships carrying the newest border guards out to Tsukushi were battered by bad seas and, eventually, they were left adrift in the water. They were rescued, but lost all of their clothing, so rather than sending clothes, the court sent cloth. 450 bolts of cloth were sent, to be made into new sets of clothing for the soldiers.
Sending raw materials makes sense. After all, there were likely artisans all over the place who just needed them. Furthermore, that way you could customize the equipment to the people who would be using it, rather than shipping off finished goods.
And with that, I think we are going to call it. Next episode will be a similar overview, but we’ll take a look at some of the laws that were passed, as well as how they dealt with law and order in the archipelago.
Until then, if you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts. If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website, SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode.
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Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast.
And that’s all for now. Thank you again, and I’ll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan.

References

Wittkamp, Robert F. (2026). Reading the Nihon Shoki: Chinese Encyclopedias, Source Criticism and Historical Writing in Old Japan. ISBN 9783695198436
Bentley, John R. (2025). Nihon Shoki: The Chronicles of Japan. ISBN 979-8-218634-67-4 pb
Bentley, J.R. (2020). The Birth of Japanese Historiography (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780367809591
McCallum, Donald F. (2009). The Four Great Temples: Buddhist Archaeology, Architecture, and Icons of Seventh-Century Japan. ISBN 978-0-8248-3114-1
Bentley, John. (2006). The Authenticity of Sendai Kuji Hongi: a New Examination of Texts, with a Translation and Commentary. ISBN-90-04-152253.
Aston, W. G. (1972). Nihongi, chronicles of Japan from the earliest times to A.D. 697. London: Allen & Unwin. ISBN0-80480984-4.
Philippi, D. L. (1968). Kojiki. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. ISBN4-13-087004-1

Episode 143: Temmu's Monumental Projects

February 16, 2026 Joshua Badgley

Indication of the location of pillar traces found in excavations of the Fujiwara Palace in Kashihara, at the Fujiwara capital site. Photo by author.

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The Temmu-Jitō Historiographical Project

In 681, the sovereign gave orders to a group of Princes and high ministers to collect the various historical documents. There are many that believe this was the start of what would become the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki, though given the differences, it seems like these works may have each leveraged some part of the effort, but may have been later works that put the historical details this effort gathered into context.

The group putting everything together included:

Royal Prince Kawashima - Second eldest son of Naka no Ōe (Tenji Tennō). He wouldn’t see the project through, either—or at least not the
Royal Prince Osakabe - Non-inheriting son of Ōama. He would also be involved with the Taihō Ritsuryō
Princes Hirose, Takeda, Kuwada, and Mino - Four non-royal princes, meaning that they were considered descendants of some prior sovereign, but their parents were not sovereigns, themselves. Unfortunately, these all appear to be locative titles, meaning they are names that come from locations that are passed to different individuals, making it difficult to determine who is who without more information. Still, it is key that they are outside of the ministerial class, and given some deference as being part of the extended royal family.
Kamitsukenu (Kōzuke) no Kimi no Michiji (Lower Daikin Rank) - The only one on the list with the “Kimi” kabane and the highest ranked official at Lower Daikin. In previous portions of the Chronicles, one would assume that that “Kimi” meant that they were the lords of Kōzuke, and the family seems to have had influence in the region. Unfortunately, they would pass away later the same year that they started the project.
Imbe no Muraji no Kobito (Middle Shōkin Rank) - A longtime supporter of the sovereign, he had joined the Yoshino side and defended Asuka, removing the planks from the bridges and building barricades to help defend from the Ōmi court. His kabane would later go from Muraji to Sukune under the new system.
Adzumi no Muraji no Inashiki (Lower Shōkin Rank) - Inashiki was a minister under the old Ōmi court, but not mentioned as directly fighting against Ōama, and would be among those pardoned by him. There must not have been too much distrust as he was clearly trusted with this task.
Naniwa no Muraji no Ōgata (no rank mentioned) - This individual is something of a mystery as no rank at all is mentioned and there seems to be no further mention of them in the Chronicles. We know that he was of the Naniwa family, which were previously the Naniwa no Kishi before they were given the status of Muraji. My assumption is that he was Lower Shōkin rank and they were just not restating it in the list.
Nakatomi no Muraji no Ōshima (Upper Daisen Rank) - Though a member of the powerful Nakatomi family, Ōshima’s position appears to have been that of scribe, helping to keep a record of what happened. This seemed to be the start of quite the career for Ōshima. He was a member of the Nakatomi house, but would later be listed as Fujiwara no Ōshima, from about 685 to 690. It is unclear if he took this name, or it was given to him—there is a bit of confusion around the name “Fujiwara” and which members of the Nakatomi clan would use it. This is something we should address at a later point in the story.
Heguri no Omi no Kobito (Lower Daisen Rank) - Another member of a prestigious family, but we don’t have much more to go on. Kobito itself is a fairly common given name in the Chronicles.

The Fujiwara Capital

We are going to discuss this more when we get into the next reign and they are actually occupying it, but the Fujiwara capital is the first time we’ve seen the state attempt to build an entire city. Previously we’ve seen “capitals” built, but it is mostly the palace, and we don’t necessarily see the larger infrastructure that was built around it. It may be that outside of the sovereign’s palace compound it was considered to be on the various ministerial families to figure out their own residences and lodging. However, in this instance it was full on large scale roads and blocks that were then divvied out amongst the ministerial families.

Palace comparisons

Oharida Palace (603-649)
Naniwa Toyosaki Palace (651-686)
Kiyomihara Palace (656-694)
Fujiwara Palace (694-710)

From the Exhibition Room of the Fujiwara Palace Site. Photo by author.

Excavation of the Palace site

From the Exhibition Room of the Fujiwara Palace Site. Photo by author.

Layout of the city

From the Fujiwara capital site. Photo by author.

Fujiwara palace ruins site

Photo by author.

Fujiwara Palace Ruins Site and Mt. Unebi

Photo by author.

Fujiwara Capital Roads

Diagram showing the excavated roads and how they may have been built. From the Exhibition Room of the Fujiwara Palace Site. Photo by author.

Kiln diorama

From the Exhibition Room of the Fujiwara Palace Site. Photo by author.

Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan. My name is Joshua and this is Episode 143: Temmu’s Monumental Projects
Ohoama sat astride his horse and looked out at the land in front of him.   He could still see the image of the rice fields, now long fallow, spreading out on the plain. To the north, east, and west, he could see the mountains that would frame his vision. As his ministers started to rattle off information about the next steps of the plan, Ohoama began to smile. He thought of the reports his embassies to the Great Tang had brought back, about the great walled cities of the continent. In his mind’s eye, Ohoama envisioned something similar, rising up on the plain in front of him.
There would be an earth and stone wall, surrounding the great city. The gates would be grand, much like the temples, but on an even greater scale. Houses would be packed in tight, each within their own walled compounds. In the center painted red and white, with green accents, would be a palace to rival any other structure in the archipelago. The people would stream in, and the city would be bustling with traffic.
This was a new center, from which the power of Yamato would be projected across the islands and even to the continent.

Greetings everyone, and welcome back. This episode we are still focused on the reign of Ohoama, aka Temmu Tennou, between the years 672 and 686.
Last episode we talked about the Four Great Temples—or the Four National Temples. Much of this episode was focused on the rise and spread of Buddhism as we see in the building of these national temples, but also on the changes that occurred as the relationship between Buddhism and the State evolved. This was part of Ohoama’s work to build up the State into something beyond what it had been in the past—or perhaps into something comparable to what they believed it to have been in the past. After all, based on the size of the tomb mounds in the kofun period, it does seem that there was a peak of prosperity in the 5th century, around the time of Wakatakeru, aka Yuryaku Tennou, and then a decline, to the point that the lineage from Wohodo, aka Keitai Tennou, seemed to have come in during a time when they were rebuilding Yamato power and authority.
This episode we are going to talk about two projects that Ohoama kicked off during his reign. He wouldn’t see the completion of either one, since both took multiple decades to complete, but both focused on linking the past and the future.
The first we’ll talk about is a new attempt to gather historical documents and records—the last time that was done was in the time of Kashikiya Hime, over 50 years ago. That was during the height of Soga power. Since then a lot had changed, and presumably there were even more stories and records that had been written down. Plus the tide had changed. So they needed to update—and maybe even correct—the historical record. But beyond that, there was a greater goal: Ohoama and his court also needed to make sure that the past was something that they wanted to go back to, among other things.
The other thing we are going to discuss is the start of a project to build a brand new capital city. And when we talk a bout city, we really mean a city. This was a massive undertaking, likely unlike anything that we’ve seen so far. Sure, there had been monumental building projects, but this was something that was going to take a lot more work - how much more monumental could you get than a new city? And it would create a physical environment that would be the embodiment of the new centralization of power and authority, and the new state that Ohoama was building, with his administration—and Yamato—at the center.
Let’s start with the big ones. First and foremost, we have the entry from the 17th day of the 3rd month of the 681. Ohoama gave a decree from the Daigokuden to commit to writing a Chronicle of the sovereigns and various matters of high antiquity. Bentley translates this as saying that they were to record and confirm the Teiki, which Aston translated as the Chronicle of the Sovereigns, and various accounts of ancient times. This task was given out to a slew of individuals, including the Royal Princes Kawashima and Osakabe; the Princes Hirose, Takeda, Kuwada, and Mino; as well as Kamitsukenu no Kimi no Michichi, Imbe no Muraji no Kobito, Adzumi no Muraji no Inashiki, Naniwa no Muraji no Ohogata, Nakatomi no Muraji no Ohoshima, and Heguri no Omi no Kobito. Ohoshima and Kobito were specifically chosen as the scribes for this effort.
We aren’t told what work was started at this time. Aston, in his translation of the Nihon Shoki, assumes that this is the start of the Kojiki. Bentley notes that this is the first in a variety of records about gathering the various records, including gathering records from the various families, and eventually even records from the various provinces. And I think we can see why. Legitimizing a new state and a new way of doing things often means ensuring that you have control of the narrative. Today, that often means doing what you can to control media and the stories that are in the national consciousness. In Ohoama’s day, I’d argue that narrative was more about the various written sources, and how they were presented. After all, many of the rituals and evidence that we are looking at would rely on the past to understand the present. The various family records would not only tell of how those families came to be, but would have important information about what else was going on, and how that was presented could determine whether something was going to be seen as auspicious, or otherwise. Even without getting rid of those records, it would be important to have the official, State narrative conform to the Truth that the state was attempting to implement.
Ultimately, there is no way to know, exactly, how everything happened. If the Nihon Shoki had a preface, it has been lost. The Kojiki, for its part, does have a preface, and it points to an origin in the reign of Ohoama—known as the sovereign of Kiyomihara. In there we are told that the sovereign had a complaint—that the Teiki and Honji, that is the chronicles of the sovereigns and the various other stories and legends, that had been handed down by various houses had come to differ from the truth. They said they had many falsehoods, which likely meant that they just didn’t match the Truth that the State was trying to push. Thus they wanted to create a so-called “true” version to pass down.
This task was given to 28 year old Hieda no Are. It says they were intelligent and had an incredible memory. They studied all of the sources, and the work continued beyond the reign of Ohoama. Later, in 711 CE, during the reign of Abe, aka Genmei Tennou, Oho no Yasumaro was given the task of writing down everything that Hieda no Are had learned.
The astute amongst you may have noticed that this mentions none of the individuals mentioned in the Nihon Shoki. Nor does the Nihon Shoki mention anything about Hieda no Are. So was this a separate effort, or all part of the same thing? Was Are using the materials collected by the project?
As you may recall, we left the Kojiki behind some time ago, since it formally ends with the reign of Kashikiya hime, aka Suiko Tennou, but realistically it ended with Wohodo, aka Keitai Tennou—after that point there are just lists of the various heirs. As such, there is some speculation that this was originally built off of earlier histories, perhaps arranged during the Soga era.
The general explanation for all of this is that Hieda no Are memorized the poems and stories, and then Yasumaro wrote them down. Furthermore, though the language in the Kojiki does not express a particular gender, in the Edo period there was a theory that Hieda no Are was a woman, which is still a popular theory.
Compare all of that to the Nihon Shoki. Where the Kojiki was often light on details and ends with Suiko Tennou, the Nihon Shoki often includes different sources, specifically mentions some of them by name, and continues up through the year 697. Furthermore, textual analysis of the Nihon Shoki suggests that it was a team effort, with multiple Chroniclers, and likely multiple teams of Chroniclers.   I have to admit, that sounds a lot more like the kind of thing that Ohoama was kicking off.
We have an entry in the Shoku Nihongi, the work that follows the Nihon Shoki, that suggests 720 for the finished compilation of the Nihon Shoki. So did it take from 681 to 720 to put together? That is a really long project, with what were probably several generations of individuals working on it.
Or should this be read in a broader sense? Was this a historiographical project, as Bentley calls it, but one that did not, immediately, know the form it would take? It isn’t the first such project—we have histories of the royal lineage and other stories that were compiled previously—much of that attributed to Shotoku Taishi, but likely part of an earlier attempt by the court. In fact, given that the Kojiki and Sendai Hongi both functionally end around the time of Kashikiya hime, that is probably because the official histories covered those periods. Obviously, though, a lot had happened, and some of what was written might not fit the current narrative. And so we see a project to gather and compile various sources. While this project likely culminated in the projects of the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki, I doubt that either work was necessarily part of the original vision. Rather, it looks like the original vision was to collect what they could and then figure things out.
It would have been after they started pulling the accounts together, reading them, and noticing the discrepancies that they would have needed to then edit them in such a way that they could tell a cohesive story. That there are two separate compilations is definitely interesting. I do suspect that Oho no Yasumaro was working from the efforts of Hieda no Are, either writing down something that had been largely captured in memory or perhaps finishing a project that Are had never completed. The Nihon Shoki feels like it was a different set of teams, working together, but likely drawing from many of the same sources.
And as to why we don’t have the earlier sources? I once heard it said that for books to be forgotten they didn’t need to be banned—they just needed to fall out of circulation and no longer be copied anymore. As new, presumably more detailed, works arose, it makes sense that older sources would not also be copied, as that information was presumably in the updated texts, and any information that wasn’t brought over had been deemed counterfactual. Even the Nihon Shoki risked falling into oblivion; the smaller and more digestible Kojiki was often more sought after. The Kojiki generally presents a single story, and often uses characters phonetically, demonstrating how to read names and places. And it just has a more story-like narrative to it. The Nihon Shoki, comparatively, is dense, written in an old form of kanbun, often relying more on kanbun than on phonetic interpretations. It was modeled on continental works, but as such it was never going to be as easy to read. And so for a long time the Kojiki seems to have held pride of place for all but the most ardent scholars of history.
Either way, I think that it is still fair to say that the record of 681 was key to the fact that we have this history, today, even if there was no way for Ohoama, at the time, to know just what form it would take.
Another ambitious project that got started under Ohoama was the development of a new and permanent capital city.
Up to this point we’ve talked about the various capitals of Yamato, but really it was more that we were talking about the palace compounds where the sovereign lived. From the Makimuku Palace, where either Mimaki Iribiko or possibly even Himiko herself once held sway, to the latest palace, that of Kiyomihara, the sovereigns of Yamato were known by their palaces. This is, in part, because for the longest time each successive sovereign would build a new palace after the previous sovereign passed away. There are various reasons why this may have been the case, often connected to insular concepts of spiritual pollution brought on by the death of an individual, but also the practical consideration that the buildings, from what we can tell, were largely made of untreated wood. That made them easier to erect, but also made them vulnerable to the elements, over time, and is probably one of the reasons that certain shrines, like the Shrine at Ise, similarly reconstitute themselves every 20 years or so.
Furthermore, we talk about palaces, but we don’t really talk about cities. There were certainly large settlements—even going back to the Wei chronicles we see the mention of some 70 thousand households in the area of Yamateg. It is likely that the Nara basin was filled with cultivated fields and many households. Princes and noble households had their own compounds—remember that both Soga no Umako and Prince Umayado had compounds large enough that they could build temples on the compounds and have enough left over for their own palatial residences, as well. However, these compounds were usually distributed in various areas, where those individuals presumably held some level of local control.
It is unclear to me how exactly the early court functioned as far as housing individuals, and how often the court was “in session”, as it were, with the noble houses. Presumably they had local accommodations and weren’t constantly traveling back and forth to the palace all the time. We know that some houses sent individuals, men and women, to be palace attendants, even though they lived some distance away. This was also likely a constraint on the Yamato court’s influence in the early days.
We do see the sovereign traveling, and various “temporary” palaces being provided. I highly doubt that these were all built on the spot, and were likely conversions of existing residences, and similar lodging may have been available for elites when they traveled, though perhaps without such pomp and circumstance.
What we don’t really see in all of this, are anything resembling cities. Now, the term “city” doesn’t exactly have a single definition, but as I’m using it, I would note that we don’t see large, permanent settlements of significant size that demonstrate the kind of larger civil planning that we would expect of such a settlement. We certainly don’t have cities in the way of the large settlements along the Yangzi and Yellow rivers.
We talked some time back about the evolution of capital city layouts on the continent. We mentioned that the early theoretical plan for a capital city was based on a square plan, itself divided into 9 square districts, with the central district constituting the palace. This design works great on paper, but not so much in practice, especially with other considerations, such as the north-south orientation of most royal buildings. And then there are geographic considerations. In a place like Luoyang, this square concept was interrupted by the river and local topography. Meanwhile, in Chang’an, they were able to attain a much more regular rectangular appearance. Here, the court and the palace were placed in the center of the northernmost wall. As such, most of the city was laid out to the south of the palace.
In each case, however, these were large, planned cities with a grid of streets that defined the neighborhoods. On each block were various private compounds, as well as the defined markets, temples, et cetera.
The first possible attempt at anything like this may have been with the Toyosaki palace, in Naniwa. There is some consideration that, given the size of the palace, there may have been streets and avenues that were built alongside it, with the intention of having a similar city layout. If so, it isn’t at all clear that it was ever implemented, and any evidence may have been destroyed by later construction on the site. Then we have the Ohotsu palace, but that doesn’t seem to be at the same scale as the Toyosaki palace—though it is possible that, again, we are missing some key evidence. Nonetheless, the records don’t really give us anything to suggest that these were large cities rather than just palaces.
There is also the timeline. While both the Toyosaki palace and the Ohotsu palace took years to build, they did not take the time and amount of manpower that would be needed to create a true capital city. We can judge this based on what it took to build the new capital at Nihiki.
This project gets kicked off in the 11th month of 676. We are told that there was an intent to make the capital at Nihiki, so all of the rice-fields and gardens within the precincts, public and private property alike, were left fallow and became totally overgrown.
This likely took some time. The next time we see Nihiki is in the 3rd month of 682, when Prince Mino, a minister of the Household Department, and others, went there to examine the grounds. At that point they apparently made the final decision to build the capital there. Ohoama came out to visit later that same month.
However, a year later, in the 12th month of 683, we are told that there was a decree for there to be multiple capitals and palaces in multiple sites, and they were going to make the Capital at Naniwa one of those places. And so public functionaries were to go figure out places for houses. So it wasn’t just that they wanted to build one new, grand capital. It sounds like they were planning to build two or three, so not just the one at Nihiki. This is also where I have to wonder if the Toyosaki Palace was still being used as an administrative center, at the very least. Or was it repurposed, as we saw that the Asuka palaces had been when the court moved to Ohotsu?
This is further emphasized a few months later, when Prince Hirose and Ohotomo Yasumaro, at the head of a group of clerks, officials, artisans, and yin yang diviners were sent around the Home Provinces to try and divine sites suitable for a capital. In addition, Prince Mino, Uneme no Oni no Tsukura, and others were sent to Shinano to see about setting up a capital there as well. Perhaps this was inspired by the relationship between the two Tang capitals of Chang’an and Luoyang. Or perhaps it was so that if one didn’t work out another one might.
Regardless, Nihiki seemed to be the primary target for this project, and in the third lunar month of 684 Ohoama visited the now barren grounds and decided on a place for the new palace. A month later, Prince Mino and others returned with a map of Shinano, but there is no indication of where they might want to build another capital.
After that, we don’t hear anything more of Shinano or of a site in the Home Provinces. We do hear one more thing about Naniwa, which we mentioned a couple of episodes back, and that is that in 686 there was a fire that burned down the palace at Naniwa, after which they seem to have abandoned that as a palace site. And so we are left with the area of Nihiki.
This project would take until the very end of 694 before it was ready. In total, we are looking at a total of about 18 years—almost two decades, to build a new capital. Some of this may have been the time spent researching other sites, but there also would have been significant time taken to clear and level. This wasn’t just fields—based on what we know, they were even taking down old kofun; we are later told about how they had to bury the bodies that were uncovered. There was also probably a pause of some kind during the mourning period when Ohoama passed away. And on top of it, this really was a big project. It wasn’t just building the palace, it was the roads, the infrastructure, and then all of the other construction—the city gates, the various private compounds, and more. One can only imagine how much was being invested, especially if they were also looking at other sites and preparing them at the same time. I suspect that they eventually abandoned the other sites when they realized just how big a project it really was that they were undertaking.
Today we know that capital as Fujiwara-kyo, based on the name of the royal palace that was built there, and remarkably, we know where it was. Excavations have revealed the site of the palace, and have given us an idea of the extent of the city: It was designed as a square, roughly 5.3 kilometers, or 10 ri, on each side. The square itself was interrupted by various terrain features, including the three holy mountains. Based on archaeological evidence, the street grid was the first thing they laid out, and from what we can tell they were using the ideal Confucian layout as first dictated in the Zhouli, or Rites of Zhou. This meant a square grid, with the palace in the center.
Indeed, the palace was centered, due south of Mt. Miminashi, and you can still go and see the palace site, today. When they went to build the palace, they actually had to effectively erase, or bury, the roads they had laid out. They did the same thing for Yakushi-ji, or Yakushi-temple, when they built it as part of the city; one of the reasons we know it had to have been built after the roads were laid out.
We will definitely talk about this more when we get to that point of the Chronicles, but for now, know that the Fujiwara palace itself, based on excavations of the site, was massive. The city itself would surpass both Heijo-kyo, at Nara, and Heian-kyo, in modern Kyoto. And the palace was like the Toyosaki Naniwa palace on steroids. It included all of the formal features of the Toyosaki Palace for running the government, but then enclosed that all in a larger compound with various buildings surrounding the court itself. Overall, the entire site is massive. This was meant as a capital to last for the ages.
And yet, we have evidence that it was never completed. For one thing, there is no evidence that a wall was ever erected around it—perhaps there was just no need, as relations with the mainland had calmed down, greatly. But there is also evidence that parts of the palace, even, were not finished at the time that they abandoned it. Fujiwara-kyo would only be occupied for about 16 years before a new capital was built—Heijo-kyo, in Nara. There are various reasons as to why they abandoned what was clearly meant to be the first permanent capital city, and even with the move to a new city in Nara it would be clear that it was going to take the court a bit of time before they were ready to permanently settle down—at least a century or so.
Based on all the evidence we have, and assuming this was the site of the eventual capital, Nihiki was the area of modern Kashihara just north of Asuka, between—and around—the mountains of Unebi, Miminashi, and Kagu. If these mountains are familiar, they popped up several times much earlier in the Chronicles--Mostly in the Age of the Gods and in the reign of the mythical Iware-biko, aka Jimmu Tennou. Yet these three mountains help to set out the boundaries of the capital city that was being built at this time.
There is definitely some consideration that they were emphasized in the early parts of the Chronicles—the mythical sections, which were bolstering the story of Amaterasu and the Heavenly Grandchild, setting up the founding myths for the dynasty. Even though the Chronicles were not completed until well after the court had moved out, the Fujiwara capital is the climax of the Nihon Shoki, which ends in 697, three years into life at the new palace. And so we can assume that much of the early, critical editing of the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki were done with the idea that this would be the new capital, and so it was woven into the histories, and had it continued as the capital, the very landscape would have recalled the stories of the divine origins of the Royal family and the state of Yamato itself.
This was the stage on which Ohoama’s state was built. He, and his successors, didn’t just change the future path of the Yamato government. They rearranged the physical and temporal environment, creating a world that centered them and their government. I suspect that Ohoama didn’t originally consider that these wouldn’t be finished during his reign. That said, he came to power in his 40s, only slightly younger than his brother, who had just died. He would live to be 56 years old—a respectable age for male sovereigns, around that time. From a quick glance, Naka no Oe was about 45 or 46 years old, while Karu lived to about 57 or 58. Tamura only made it to 48. The female sovereigns seem to have lasted longer, with Ohoama’s mother surviving until she was 66 or 67 years old, and Kashikiya Hime made it to the ripe old age of 74. That said, it is quite likely that he thought he would make it longer. After all, look at all the merit he was accruing! Still, he passed away before he could see these projects fully accomplished. That would have to be left for the next reign—and even that wasn’t enough. The Fujiwara Capital would only be occupied for a short time before being abandoned about two reigns later, and the histories as we know them wouldn’t be complete for three more reigns.
So given all of this, let’s take another quick look at Ohoama himself and where he stands at this pivotal moment of Yamato history.When we look at how he is portrayed, Ohoama is generally lionized for the work he is said to have accomplished. I would argue that he is the last of three major figures to whom are attributed most of the changes that resulted in the sinification of the Yamato government.
The first is prince Umayado, aka Shotoku Taishi, who is said to have written the 17 article constitution, the first rank system, and the introduction of Buddhism. To be fair, these things—which may not have been exactly as recorded in the Chronicles—were likely products of the court as a whole. Many people attribute more to Kashikiya Hime, aka Suiko Tennou, as well as Soga no Umako. Of course, Soga no Umako wasn’t a sovereign, or even a member of the royal family, and Kashikiya Hime, aka Suiko Tennou, seems to have likewise been discounted, at least later, possibly due to the fact that she is thought to have come to power more as a compromise candidate than anything else—she was the wife of a previous sovereign and niece to Soga no Umako. Many modern scholars seem to focus more on the agency of Kashikiya Hime and suggest that she had more say than people tend to give her credit for. That said, Shotoku Taishi seems to have been the legendary figure that was just real enough to ascribe success to. That he died before he could assume the throne just meant that he didn’t have too many problematic decisions of his own to apparently work around.
The next major figure seems to be Naka no Oe, aka Tenji Tennou. Naka no Oe kicks off the period of Great Change, the Taika era, and is credited with a lot of the changes—though I can’t help but notice that the formal sovereign, Naka no Oe’s uncle, Karu, seems to have stuck with the new vision of the Toyosaki Palace and the administrative state while Naka no Oe and his mother moved back to the traditional capital. And when Naka no Oe moved the capital to Ohotsu, he once again built a palace more closely aligned to what we see in Asuka than the one in Naniwa, which brings some questions about how the new court was operating. But many of his reforms clearly were implemented, leveraging the new concepts of continental rulership to solidify the court’s hegemony over the rest of the archipelago.
Ohoama, as represented in the Chronicles, appears to be the culmination of these three. He is building on top of what his brother had implemented through the last three reigns. Some of what he did was consolidate what Naka no Oe had done, but there were also new creations, for which Ohoama is credited, even if most of the work was done outside of Ohoama’s reign, but they were attributed to Ohoama, nonetheless. Much of this was started later in Ohoama’s reign, and even today there seem to be some questions about who did what. Nonetheless, we can at least see how the Chroniclers were putting the story together.
There are a lot of scholars that point to the fact that the bulk of the work of these projects would actually be laid out in the following reigns, and who suggest that individuals like the influential Uno no Sarara, who held the control of the government in Ohoama’s final days, may have had a good deal more impact on how things turned out, ultimately. In fact, they might even have been more properly termed her projects—there are some that wonder if some of the attributions to Ohoama were meant to bolster the authority of later decrees, but I don’t really see a need for that, and it seems that there is enough evidence to suggest that these projects were begun in this period.
All of this makes it somewhat ironic that by the time the narrative was consolidated and published to the court, things were in a much different place—literally. The Fujiwara capital had been abandoned. The court, temples, and the aristocracy had picked up stakes and moved north. Fujiwara no Fuhito had come on the scene, and now his family was really taking off. This was not the same world that the Chronicles had been designed around.
And yet, that is what was produced. Perhaps there is a reason that they ended where they did.
From that point on, though, there were plenty of other projects to record what was happening. Attempts to control the narrative would need to do a lot more. We see things like the Sendai Kuji Hongi, with its alternative, and perhaps even subversive, focus on the Mononobe family. And then later works like the Kogoshui, recording for all time the grievances of the Imbe against their rivals—for all the good that it would do. With more people learning to write, it was no longer up to the State what did or did not get written down.
But that has taken us well beyond the scope of this reign—and this episode, which we should probably be bringing to a close. There are still some things here and there that I want to discuss about this reign—so the next episode may be more of a miscellany of various records that we haven’t otherwise covered, so far.
Until then if you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts. If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website, SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode.
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Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast.
And that’s all for now. Thank you again, and I’ll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan.

References

Wittkamp, Robert F. (2026). Reading the Nihon Shoki: Chinese Encyclopedias, Source Criticism and Historical Writing in Old Japan. ISBN 9783695198436
Bentley, John R. (2025). Nihon Shoki: The Chronicles of Japan. ISBN 979-8-218634-67-4 pb
Bentley, J.R. (2020). The Birth of Japanese Historiography (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780367809591
McCallum, Donald F. (2009). The Four Great Temples: Buddhist Archaeology, Architecture, and Icons of Seventh-Century Japan. ISBN 978-0-8248-3114-1
Bentley, John. (2006). The Authenticity of Sendai Kuji Hongi: a New Examination of Texts, with a Translation and Commentary. ISBN-90-04-152253.
Aston, W. G. (1972). Nihongi, chronicles of Japan from the earliest times to A.D. 697. London: Allen & Unwin. ISBN0-80480984-4.
Philippi, D. L. (1968). Kojiki. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. ISBN4-13-087004-1

Tsukushi Dazai (筑紫太宰)

Kibi Dazai (吉備太宰)

Settsu-shiki no Daibu (攝津職大夫)

Rough Transcript

References

The Temmu-Jitō Historiographical Project

The Fujiwara Capital

Rough Transcript

References