What would you do if you stood at the top of the Japanese government in the Heian Period?
I suggest getting down because you might get hurt.
The Fujiwara clan found themselves at the top and what they did was...
removed their enemies, and tried to stop the government from collapsing.
If you didn’t know, the Fujiwara (藤原) clan famously married their daughters into
the Imperial Family, allowing them control over the Heian court for 200 years, from around
850 to 1068.
These guys didn’t mess around.
The clan was founded by Nakatomi no Kamatari (中臣鎌足) after he helped rid the court
of the tyrannical Soga (蘇我) clan in 645.
At least, that’s how they told the story.
If you were a Soga, you would have said they took power through a treasonous bloody coup.
You say potato, I say tomato.
Japan in these early years was still a teenager, engaged in high school drama.
This drama took the form of a struggle for dominance between the Imperial Family and
the country’s top clans.
After the Heian Period, Japan grew up, discovered it had superpowers, and went mad and started
blowing up houses and people.
I’ve been watching The Boys.
The ties that bound clan members together were strong since the beginning.
It’s not surprising then that various clans would often dominate the Japanese court.
In the Heian Period, it was the Fujiwara’s turn.
It became accepted that a Fujiwara would hold the title of regent, someone who made decisions
on behalf of the emperor.
If the emperor was a child, a Fujiwara would be sessho (摂政), regent for an underaged
emperor.
When the baby emperor grew up, a Fujiwara would be kanpaku (関白), regent for an adult
emperor.
It became common to give the throne to child princes so that the regent could rule in his
stead.
It wouldn’t do to have a troublesome emperor interfering in the ruling of his own court.
Over time, Fujiwara clan members grabbed all of the top government positions, and the Fujiwara
tentacles tightened.
These were not happy tentacles.
At the height of their power, a man named Fujiwara no Michinaga (藤原道長) sat at
the head of the clan.
He was the strongest of them all and the apex politician in court.
He actually only held the regent position for one year, then slid it to his son.
For the two decades afterwards, Michinaga controlled the court as the court document
inspector, technically a lower ranked position.
Just goes to show that Fujiwara power did not come from the regent position, it came
from the family name and the amount of Fujiwara members and allies they had in government.
Michinaga didn’t take crap from no one.
He packed every level of government with his clan members and allies.
He was ruthless in removing his enemies.
Once, his nephew opposed him and Michi-not-ganna-take-any-s--t exiled the fool.
It was easy for the aristocracy to immerse themselves amidst the paper screens and swanky
parties of the Heian capital, where people wore $120 T-shirts from Kanye.
But Michinaga was smart enough to notice the warrior culture rising outside the capital,
in the provinces.
He made friends with a minor clan, the Minamoto (源).
Now the Minamoto were minor only in the glittery eyes of the capital elite.
In the provinces, they were a military clan that loitered around the top of the food chain.
Having Minamoto allies meant he could gently persuade people with violence.
His two main loyal generals were Minamoto no Yorimitsu (源頼光) and Minamoto no Yorinobu
(源頼信), both interesting men who we will ignore.
Michinaga’s enemies called these men the “running dogs” of the Fujiwara.
Good one, Michinaga’s enemies.
He was rolling in dough that Michinaga.
Being the most powerful man meant many offers of bootylingus and people showering you with
gifts, which makes me jealous because you guys don’t give me s--t.
I meant gifts, not bootylingus.
Michinaga also wasn’t above using government funds for private gain like rebuilding his
estate after a fire.
The Fujiwara house looked back at his reign favorably, calling it a golden age.
Not a stranger to flexing, Michinaga said during an illness, “I have nothing to be
embarrassed about if I die, none in the future will equal what I have done.”
He died at 62, from a burst ego, we presume.
The Fujiwara regents presided over an age of cultural flowering, when the Heian aristocracy
worshipped their cult of beauty and churned out endless love stories and emo poetry.
Thought it’s important to understand that the Fujiwara did not have absolute power.
They worked within the system.
Sure, they had men at the top and their patriarch led the government, but they didn’t make
policies like dictators.
The court deliberated and hashed out policies within the governing Council of State.
There was also conflict within the Fujiwara clan, it wasn’t monolithic.
Clans had their own bureaucracies, internal offices to manage things and resolve disputes.
So the Fujiwara had kind of a parallel government structure running alongside the official government.
People would often go to a Fujiwara office to resolve disputes rather than go to the
court.
They often agreed on important decisions using the private bureaucracy before going to the
formal channels to make things official.
The larger struggle for power between the Imperial House and the clans happened on a
smaller scale within the Fujiwara house.
Because they dominated the court, they were pulled in two opposite directions.
In the Heian Period, the court started giving away tax-free land, or shoen, to temples and
government officials as payment and rewards.
You didn’t have to pay taxes to the court if you owned these shoen.
People treated these lands like Pokemon and tried to catch em all.
The Fujiwara accumulated the largest number of shoen.
Giving the Fujiwara more shoen diverted tax money that would have gone to the court into
Fujiwara coffers.
Good for them right?
Not quite, because they also controlled the court remember.
Less tax revenue for the court also meant less resources that the Fujiwara could use
for government projects and paying court officials and controlling the power of rival clans.
It was a balancing act.
The Heian government was in a bad place.
The extravagant ceremonies and money flexing of the capital elites hid a poison underneath.
It wasn’t a time of growth for the government.
Many of the policies passed by the court in this period revealed a government that was
not trying to grow its resources and power.
No, it was a government desperately trying to cling to the power it already had, a government
gradually losing tax revenue and influence.
We’ll talk about why in a future video.
When faced with growing problems and crises, the nobles continued to carry out their lavish
ceremonies and rituals.
Now you may criticize these out of touch one percenters for paying too much attention to
stupid rituals.
But it wasn’t because they just wanted to party and ignore their problems.
Most people back then believed the best way to handle problems was to appeal to the gods.
They thought ceremonies and rituals to please the gods were more useful than anything humans
could do.
Happy gods, happy times.
So you’re right, they did pay too much attention to stupid rituals.
While the capital was secretly struggling, like my friend’s marriage, a new breed of
nobles arose in the provinces.
The job of the governors of Heian Japan’s 68 provinces was to send tax revenue to the
capital.
The capital didn’t really care how they got the money.
These provincial governors could pretty much do whatever they liked, so they would send
an appropriate amount of money to the capital, and keep the rest.
Lack of oversight allowed these governors to pull all kinds of shenanigans to keep the
money that flowed to the capital as low as possible.
These provincial governors became the new money.
If you were a court official who wanted to be rich, you’d go after these provincial
governor spots.
These positions were appointed by the regent’s office, the Fujiwara.
This was good news for them.
Ambitious nobles would shower the Fujiwara heads with gifts like horses and oxen and
money.
Some people called these bribes, but those people were losers.
The Fujiwara were doing great.
They were riding high, and they rode right off a cliff, a cliff named Emperor Go-Sanjo
(後三条天皇).
So I have a playlist about the Fujiwara clan right here, starting with the Soga coup.
Check it out, check it out.
I wanna thank the new patrons this week: Antara Choudhary, bander, Fabian Kaus, Kayli, and
Yukinobu Kurata.
Alright much love guys, and spread the knowledge!