Murder, schemes, and political maneuvering, executed with ruthlessness and competence.
That described Empress Jito, the third female empress of Japan.
She was daughter to Emperor Tenji.
When Tenji died, he left the throne to his son.
Tenji’s brother didn’t like Tenji’s son very much and thought,
“Well, why don’t I just kill him?”
And he did.
It was called the Jinshin War, and afterwards the brother became Emperor Tenmu.
Tenmu turned out to be a skillful leader, and so too was his beloved consort, Jito.
She was 29.
Yes, she married her uncle, but this was normal for the Imperial House.
From the beginning, it was clear that she was no passive wife.
Don’t ask her for sandwiches.
The historical texts say she followed Tenmu to the battlefront whenever he went to war.
Although she didn’t fight herself, she addressed the troops and mingled with the men.
She and Tenmu strategized together, it was really cute.
“Shall we attack their flanks, honey?”
“No, let’s use a pincer move and ram our pincers up their--”
Off the battlefield, Jito was a masterful politician.
It seems she and Tenmu governed jointly.
In the historical texts, we see them announce administrative laws, addressing their subjects
jointly, like equals.
Jito was a good mother.
And what do all good mothers do?
Tuck you into bed, make your lunches,
and orchestrate the elimination of your political
rivals to ensure that you sit on the throne.
Jito had one son, Prince Kusakabe, and she was determined to make him the next emperor.
Now Tenmu had many consorts and children, but he eventually made Kusakabe the crown
prince, his heir to the throne.
You can bet Jito had something to do with it.
They groomed Kusakabe for leadership, giving him administrative jobs.
They also made a bunch of Tenmu’s sons swear that they agree with Kusakabe being the crown
prince.
Near the end of his reign, Tenmu announced that Jito and Kusakabe would handle all state
affairs.
However, Kusakabe’s future was not yet secure.
Kusakabe had health issues, making him a less desirable candidate.
And there was an up-and-comer, this accursed little hotshot named Prince Otsu, who was
very capable, much more than Kusakabe.
This is only my guess, but Kusakabe seemed like the spoiled son whose parents wanted
him to take over the family business, but everyone knew he’d just end up mucking everything
up.
That’s probably why when Emperor Tenmu died, Kusakabe did not succeed his father.
We can imagine there was opposition to him, people may have preferred Prince Otsu instead.
Jito, being the imposing figure that she was, immediately took over the reins of government,
she wasn’t even officially enthroned.
She became a regent, a temporary ruler.
It was bad news for the capable Prince Otsu.
Jito wasted no time.
She accused Otsu of plotting a rebellion and forced him to commit suicide.
Historians widely believe that these were false charges to remove Otsu the Obstacle.
Unfortunately, all her scheming was for naught.
Kusakabe later died,
from karma.
Okay it could have been from his poor health, it could also have been foul play.
Whatever it was, Jito’s pride and joy was gone, so she finally took the throne herself
and became empress.
Turned out she was a superb leader.
She continued implementation of the Kiyomihara Codes.
These were laws passed under Tenmu based on Chinese ideas of the centralized state.
In the Nara Period, Japan was still in the middle of trying to create a strong central
authority that could curb the influence of the powerful clans.
She instituted wide-reaching tax and land reforms to support raising troops and making
a strong bureaucracy.
She also built the first large Chinese-style capital: Fujiwara-kyo.
This was Japan’s capital before it moved to Nara.
Before Fujiwara-kyo, the capital moved whenever a new emperor came to power, it was little
more than the emperor’s residence.
Fujiwara-kyo was different.
It was much bigger and it became the capital for three consecutive rulers.
Now Kusakabe had a son before he died, making him Jito’s grandson.
And Jito would love nothing more than to have her grandson rule after her.
Problem was, her husband Tenmu had been very...
active...
when he was alive.
Tenmu the Thirsty had many sons and among them were many strong contenders for emperorship.
And they all had to go, thought Jito.
Killing them wasn’t an option, there were too many, and it would be a little suspicious
if Tenmu’s sons started dying randomly.
No, she needed a different plan.
A more clever one.
She used the fact that her father Tenji was a popular emperor.
Before Tenji died, he had appointed his son as crown prince.
She and her supporters claimed that by doing this, Tenji had wanted to establish a rule
to be obeyed thereafter:
a son should follow his father as emperor.
Let’s ignore the fact that her own husband, Tenmu, took the throne from Tenji’s son.
Empress Jito also created a National Memorial Day for her dead son Kusakabe.
Such a day was reserved for emperors, so she kind of shoe-horned him in as an emperor after
his death.
This also meant that it made her role as empress something like a placeholder until the next
male emperor takes power.
We would see future empresses follow suit with this placeholder role.
All this had a purpose.
If we go by Tenji’s rule that a son should follow the father, since Kusakabe was the
previous emperor, it made only Kusakabe’s son legitimate.
This eliminated all of Tenmu’s sons.
And for the coup de grace, Jito abdicated the throne in favor of her grandson, who became
Emperor Monmu.
Before Jito, the next emperor usually came to power after the previous one died.
Jito didn’t wait.
Again, Jito started a trend where future empresses would abdicate the throne instead of ruling
until death.
This made a lot of sense, actually, if you wanted to make sure the right person succeeded
you.
Empress Jito continued to be an influential leader in court, and allied herself with the
up-and-coming Fujiwara clan, particularly Fujiwara no Fuhito.
She helped them marry into the Imperial Family, and they helped with her plans.
Fujiwara power only grew from here on out.
Even on her deathbed, Empress Jito reiterated the father-to-son succession rule, always
looking out for her family.
Then she said,
“Get me a drink, I need to relax now.”
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