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The first is the Court in Kyoto and the Muromachi Bakufu, where the Hosokawa, the Miyoshi, and the Matsunaga deluged the streets with blood and reduced the city to ashes. The second is the Hojo of Odawara, who compassed the destruction of the kubo at Koga and of the two original Uesugi families.
His long travels to investigate the methods of other masters so as to assimilate their best features, are historically recorded, and at the head of the great trinity of Japanese swordsmiths his name is placed by universal acclaim, his companions being Go no Yoshihiro and Fujiwara Yoshimitsu.* In Muromachi days so much depended on the sword that military men thought it worthy of all honour.
The first two shitsuji at Muromachi were Ko Moronao, the great general, and Uesugi Tomosada, a connexion of Takauji. Kamakura was not neglected, however.
Ryoshun had been selected for service in Kyushu by the great shitsuji of Muromachi, Hosokawa Yoriyuki, who saw that only by the strongest hands could the turbulent families of the southern island be reduced to order the Shimazu, the Otomo, the Shoni, and the Kikuchi. Everything went to show that Imagawa would have succeeded had not that familiar weapon, slander, been utilized for his overthrow.
In 1416, however, an ambassador from the islands presented himself at the Muromachi shogunate, and twenty-five years later , the shogun Yoshinori, just before his death, bestowed Ryukyu on Shimazu Tadakuni, lord of Satsuma, in recognition of meritorious services.
It was evidently of prime necessity from the Muromachi point of view that a state of affairs which crippled the shogun by impoverishing him should be remedied. Sasaki Takayori, head of the Rokkaku house, was a conspicuous product of his time. He had seized the manors of nearly fifty landowners in the province of Omi, and to punish his aggressions signally would furnish a useful object lesson.
Instructions were also issued from Muromachi to the officials in Kyushu, peremptorily interdicting piracy and ordering the arrest of any that contravened the veto. Further, the high constables in several provinces were enjoined to encourage trade with China by sending the best products of their localities.
Moreover, the Muromachi shogun was a disciple and patron of the Zen sect of Buddhism, and the priests of that sect always advocated peaceful intercourse with China, the source of philosophic and literary learning.
Ashikaga Masatomo, seeking to disinherit his eldest son, Chachamaru, in favour of his second son, Yoshimichi, was killed by the former, the latter taking refuge with the Imagawa family in Suruga, by whom he was escorted to the capital, where he became the Muromachi shogun under the name of Yoshizumi.
A puny man of contemptible presence, Mitsusuke received little consideration at Muromachi, and the shogun was induced to promise his office of high constable to a handsome kinsman, Mochisada. Enraged at such partiality, Mitsusuke set fire to his mansion in Kyoto and withdrew to his castle at Shirahata in Harima.
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