Muromachi period
Historical periods室町時代 ・ Reading: Muromachi jidai
Definition
The era from 1336 to 1573, when the Ashikaga shoguns ruled from the Muromachi district of Kyoto. Zen culture flowered into dry landscape gardens, the tea ceremony, and temples like Kinkaku-ji, before the age dissolved into civil war.
Zen culture in full flower
The Ashikaga shoguns governed from Kyoto, and under their patronage Zen aesthetics shaped almost everything now thought of as classically Japanese. Shogun Yoshimitsu built the Golden Pavilion, Kinkaku-ji, in 1397; his grandson Yoshimasa answered with the quieter Silver Pavilion, Ginkaku-ji, where the tea ceremony and tatami-floored rooms took shape. Zen monasteries of the official gozan network were centers of learning, ink painting, and garden design, and the dry landscape garden, karesansui, reached perfection at temples like Ryōan-ji with its fifteen enigmatic stones.
Into the warring states
The era's second half collapsed into violence. The Ōnin War of 1467-1477 burned most of Kyoto, including many of its great temples, and shattered central authority. The century that followed is called the Sengoku, or Warring States, period, when regional lords fought for supremacy and monasteries fielded armies of warrior monks. Many Kyoto temples you visit today were rebuilt after these fires, which is why so few structures predate the fifteenth century.
Common questions
- What is a karesansui garden?
- Are Kinkaku-ji and Ginkaku-ji original buildings?
Ginkaku-ji preserves its original 1480s pavilion. Kinkaku-ji is a faithful 1955 reconstruction: the 1397 pavilion survived every war only to be burned down by an arsonist in 1950.
- What was the Sengoku period?
The roughly one hundred years of civil war that followed the Ōnin War of 1467, overlapping the late Muromachi era. Central authority collapsed and regional warlords, the sengoku daimyō, fought until reunification began in 1568.