Toyotomi Hideyoshi

Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1537- 1598), a famous strategist and politician who completed the cause of reunifying Japan at the end of the Warring States Period, was also the Edo period (1603- 1868) and the "Taoshan period" in Japanese history books (65438+).

Toyotomi Hideyoshi (formerly known as Muxia Deyi Langxiuji, later named Yuchai Xiuji, 1585, Toyotomi Hideyoshi) was born in a poor peasant family in Aichi Prefecture, Zhang Wei. My father died early and began to wander at the age of eight. He traveled all over Sanhe, Yuanjiang and Hejun and returned to Zhang Wei at the age of eighteen. Soon, he went to Nobuyasu Oda to take a humble position (hereafter referred to as, I have been following Nobuyasu to the battlefield in the name of a soldier of the People's Samurai Corps (barefoot) and a leader of the people's courage (head of the barefoot regiment, barefoot general)), and obtained the position of samurai (scholar). 1573, due to his military achievements over the years, he won 220,000 stones near the food city in three counties in Jiangbei, and established a ruling stronghold in Changbin (now Shiga County), becoming a local small vassal, with a status of "five" to nobility.

1577, Nobunaga divided his forces and launched a national unification war. Nobunaga sent Shibata Katsuie to conquer Takeda's home in the north and Ji Chuan Yiyi to conquer the North Island's home in the east. In the west, including China, Shikoku and Kyushu, Hideyoshi served as the "Western State Leader" and was responsible for the command task of this main battlefield. Hideyoshi, based in Himeji City, successively pacified Bomo (Hyogo Prefecture), Bieqian (southeast of Okayama Prefecture), Misa (north of Okayama Prefecture) and Dananfan (Wu Qu Prefecture), which made Hideyoshi hold a high position among Nobunaga generals.

1582 In June, Nobunaga died in the change of Boneng Temple, and Hideyoshi immediately returned to Shimosaki (Hyogo Prefecture) to organize and condemn Akechi Mitsuhide's "Yamazaki decisive battle". Toyotomi Hideyoshi held high the banner of crusade against Nobunaga and loyalty to Nobunaga before the ministries of Nobunaga, which won Toyotomi Hideyoshi political prestige as the successor of Nobunaga's career. In order to consolidate and develop this prestige, on June 27th, Toyotomi Hideyoshi joined forces with the main generals in Cheongju and established the naive Hideyoshi Oda (the grandson of Nobuo Nagata), which actually created conditions for Toyotomi Hideyoshi to gain the leadership position of the unified regime. On June+10 in the same year, Toyotomi Hideyoshi presided over a grand burial ceremony for Nobunobu at Daejeon Temple in Kyoto. Due to the contradiction with Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the arrangement of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, not only Nobunaga's veterans Shibata Katsuie and Tokugawa Yiyi did not attend, but even Nobunaga's second son (Nobunaga) and third son (Nobunaga) did not show up. This arrangement shows that Hideyoshi is determined to remove all obstacles that prevent him from establishing his leadership position. 1583 In April, Toyotomi Hideyoshi finally launched the "Battle of Cheap Yue" and wiped out the allied forces with Nobunaga. 1584 In April, the "Battle of Pastoral Mountain" was launched with Tokugawa Ieyasu and Nobuo Oda. Through these two wars, Toyotomi Hideyoshi's position as the actual heir of Nobunaga's career was established.

After obtaining the leading position of the unified regime, Toyotomi Hideyoshi has successively waged three major battles and completed the unfinished cause of reunification. 1585, Xiuji sent troops of 65,438+10,000. After sweeping the Genlai Temple and Zhahe monks in Jizhou (most of Wakayama and a part of Mie Prefecture), they attacked Houyue (Niigata Prefecture) and moved to Feiqing (Gifu Prefecture) to pacify the central and northern parts of Honshu. 1587, mobilized 300,000 troops from 37 countries, swept Kyushu, and went straight to Kagoshima, forcing Shimazu Yoshihisa to cut its hair and surrender. 1589, assembled 260,000 troops from 45 countries, attacked Musashi (Tokyo, Yuqi Prefecture and Kanagawa), Sagami (Kanagawa) and Ueno (Gunma Prefecture), surrounded Odahara (the capital of Houbeitiao), and forced the North to surrender. Later, Chen Bing went to Tianjin (located in Fukushima Prefecture) and Aobao (located in the northeast of China). So far, * * * has pacified 38 countries (Japan was divided into 68 countries at that time). 1590, the great cause of reunifying Japan was completed. 1593, Toyotomi Hideyoshi officially transferred Hokkaido to Japanese territory.

In the process of reunification, Toyotomi Hideyoshi has established a powerful centralized government. Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who achieved reunification entirely on his own, attached great importance to the name of the Emperor, and constantly promoted himself to Major General Guards, the Senate, the Minister of the Interior, and even from a Guan Bai (1) and Minister Zheng Tai, ranking first among the nobles, making the personal autocratic power cast a mysterious aperture on the traditional authority of the Emperor.

As Guan Bai of the imperial court, Hideyoshi held the military and political power, but he did not inherit the original * * * institutions of the imperial court. On the contrary, under the leadership of Guan Bai, he selected cronies from family ministers to form a "Five Chases" to take charge of religious, judicial, administrative, financial and civil affairs, and handle the daily affairs of the central government. After that, the local names with their own influence formed the "five old", through which the central government ensured the effective control of the localities.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi also attached great importance to expanding the financial base of the central government, directly managing one-tenth of the total land rent of feudal lords in China (there are 2.2 million stones buried underground), directly managing most of the annual output of gold and silver mines in China, and directly managing the commercial taxes of major cities in China (including Kyoto, Osaka, Sakai, Hakata and other nearly ten major cities in Japan at that time), thus giving the central government powerful economic means. In this way, Toyotomi Hideyoshi became the supreme monarch who actually ruled the whole Japan.

In order to consolidate unity and strengthen the feudal ruling order, Xiuji implemented a series of far-reaching policies and measures through centralized government.

The most fundamental of Xiuji's ruling policy is the reform of land relations. This reform began with Nobunaga, who began to "inspect the land" (land clearing survey) from 1569 in order to organize military supplies and collect land rent in the occupied areas. This kind of land inspection also means denying the landlord's lease right, but the area is limited and there are no constructive measures. Xiuzhi not only carried out land supervision nationwide, but also gradually formed a new system, which was called "Taige Land Supervision" in history books, especially in the Luwen period after the national reunification (1592- 1595). Hideyoshi established a set of policies to treat local names and farmers, which laid the foundation for the establishment of centralized feudal system in Japan.

Implementing the "Zhu system", establishing the state-owned system of the famous neighboring countries and strengthening the central government's control over the local feudal forces are an important aspect of the land inspection. According to this system, all feudal lords (including royal courts and temple fairs) need to have land certificates with Xiuji seal (that is, Zhu seal) to make their territorial ownership effective. This system not only eliminated all the remaining powers of the manor owners, but also constituted the power basis for the central government to control local birthright. Daming had to undertake a series of economic, governmental and military obligations stipulated by Toyotomi Hideyoshi in order to gain Toyotomi Hideyoshi's recognition of its territorial ownership. Xiuji implements the "national substitution system", and Daming is subject to the central government's reduction and substitution of Daming's territory; Xiuji implements the "city-cutting system", and Daming will dismantle many military town strongholds according to Xiuji's intention; Xiuji implements the "military service system", and Daming should provide military service to the central government according to the amount of land rent income. Daming must pay taxes (transport gold) to Xiuji when mining non-straight gold and silver mines in China; Xiuji is engaged in major construction projects, and Daming will provide wood and stone for her husband. There is also a "forbidden private marriage system" to prevent collusion between celebrities (the marriage relationship between celebrities without the permission of Xiuji is called private marriage), a "hostage system" that forces celebrities to be loyal to the central government (taking family members of celebrities and capable retainers as the quality), and a "pilgrimage system" (Daming himself will move to the seat of Xiuji regime), all of which ensure the great binding force of the central government on local separatist forces. Therefore, the implementation of the Zhu system not only means the transition of the manor owner's land ownership to the Daming system, but also means the development of the feudal owner's land ownership of the Edo shogunate (central government) (local name) from the Daming system to the Daming system. After Toyotomi Hideyoshi came to power, Daming's incomplete ownership of his own territory determined that his independence in economy, politics and military affairs was incomplete. After reunification, Daming completely lost its independent character during the Warring States period. After reunification, Japan ended the turbulent situation of long-term vassal regime and frequent civil strife, which was related to Toyotomi Hideyoshi's reform of land ownership.

Another important aspect of the change of land relations is to recognize the right of small farmers to farm permanently. Jixiu District Inspection stipulates that the national field calculation method should be unified into 1 in 300 steps (previously 360 steps were generally1); It is stipulated that each section of dry land is divided into upper, middle, lower and lower levels, with different rent rates and absolute rents (Shi Sheng); It is stipulated that the undertaker of each section of land rent is the farmer as a direct labor producer (called "one person and one place"); It also stipulates that land rent is mainly paid in kind (stone height system) and so on. These measures certainly reflect the feudal lords' intention to strengthen feudal exploitation and safeguard the natural economy, but it is important to prohibit the previous layer-by-layer exploitation between farmers and lords and limit the arbitrary exploitation of landlords when collecting land rent, especially to legally protect the permanent farming rights of small farmers to ensure the right to collect land rent, combine land with labor, and ensure the minimum living and working conditions for farmers to engage in production, which will undoubtedly enhance the enthusiasm of small farmers. From the standpoint of strengthening the feudal ruling order, promoting the society destroyed by the long-term war has met the land requirements of small farmers to a certain extent, which is one of the important reasons why peasant riots have occurred in various places since the14th century, and the peasant movement that lasted for nearly 200 years began to decline for a long time. Although Hideyoshi is not the representative of farmers' interests, he is the feudal monarch who knows farmers best, is familiar with farmers and is good at ruling farmers in Japanese history.

Xiuji's policy towards industrialists and businessmen has more progressive factors. The unification movement of Xiuji itself objectively promoted the development of commercial industry. In order to consolidate the expanding occupied area, Toyotomi Hideyoshi completely abolished all Japanese border tax cards (customs) in the Warring States period, even including the customs within the royal family and the imperial court (Nobunobu did not abolish it); Built roads and bridges connecting all of Japan; Established a ship system for sailing all over Japan (1582, Hideyoshi decided in Iwaya that barges in the occupied area could sail out of the original "national" boundary with the development of the war situation); Unify the weights and measures used throughout Japan (for example, 36 towns are 1 mile); Coins circulating in all parts of Japan were minted ("Tianzheng Great Trial" was minted at 1588, and "Zhu Xiao" and "Tianzheng Bao Tong" with exchange function were minted after 1596). In this way, it is possible for commodity circulation, finance and land and water transportation to break through the framework of local domain economy and promote the further development of commodity-currency relations and the formation of the national market.

In order to seize the tax revenue of the commercial industry monopolized by the manor owner and separate the connection between the small and medium-sized businessmen and the peasant movement, after the walk, Xiuji implemented the policy of abolishing the feudal commercial handicraft guild (the Japanese industrial and commercial guild was called "the seat" at that time) in various parts of Japan, which not only cut off the subordinate relationship between all businessmen and manor nobles, but also gave the small and medium-sized businessmen and craftsmen outside the guild organization the opportunity to work freely. At the same time, in order to strive for the supply of goods outside the ruling area during the United War, Xiuji also implemented a market opening policy called "Xerox", exempting all kinds of market taxes and ensuring commercial safety and free trade of goods. This policy of "Happy City" and "Happy Seat" directly promoted the development trend of industrial and commercial freedom sprouted in the war since Muromachi era. At the same time, Toyotomi Hideyoshi also paid great attention to win the support of businessmen from all over the world for the United War, giving them courtesy of famous ministers, relying on them to raise munitions, collect military intelligence and carry out surrender activities. Moreover, many civil and military officials from businessmen were directly appointed (such as one of the pioneers of the Japanese invaders, one of the five purposes), which had an impact on the improvement of the social status of businessmen at that time. In addition, in terms of foreign trade, Toyotomi Hideyoshi once allowed western businessmen to trade in Japan, implemented the "Athena Chu Ship System", and chartered eight wealthy businessmen to engage in overseas trade with nine seagoing ships, which enabled Japan's foreign trade to have normal channels. These are conducive to the development of commercial capital.

Of course, Hideyoshi's weakening of local names does not weaken feudal rule, but strengthens the feudal centralized rule of the entire Japanese feudal main class; Xiuji satisfied the peasants' land requirements to a certain extent, but at the same time completely disarmed the peasants (Jianzong's inaugural meeting), deprived the peasants of their freedom to leave the cultivated land (the policy of returning the peasants who left the land to their residence and cultivated land), and asked them to farm only for generations (identity system), wearing the feudal shackles that had been relaxed again; In his contacts with commercial industrialists, Xiuji constantly created a free atmosphere of abolishing guilds and opening markets, but at the same time, he kept pulling commercial industrialists back under the feudal control of unified kingship through the imperial "business division" and "professional head" (that is, craftsman head). In fact, it was in the unification movement of Nobunaga and Hideyoshi that the municipality that marked the free development of Muromachi industry and commerce in Japan finally disappeared. All these explain the feudal essence of Xiuji's unified regime.

The feudal nature of Xiuji regime is also clearly reflected in the foreign policy after reunification. In the second year after reunification (159 1), Toyotomi Hideyoshi ordered the invasion of North Korea, in order to divert the attention of feudal generals from the domestic struggle for feudal territory and make up for the lack of fiscal revenue through foreign plunder. 1592, he launched a war of aggression against Korea with an army of160,000. After occupying Pyongyang, he even attempted to move the capital to Beijing and establish a feudal empire including Japan, Korea, China and India. Because of the loyal opposition of the Korean people and the Ming Dynasty's * * * sending troops to aid Korea, Xiuji's invasion plan failed, and 1596 made peace, but it failed. 1597, the Toyotomi family sent140,000 troops to invade Korea, which was also attacked by the Chinese and Korean armies. 1598 In August, Toyotomi Hideyoshi died of illness and the war ended in failure.