Conclusion

The eventual success of Yoshimitsu and his immediate successors in dominating both the military and imperial realms of politics resulted in the creation of a stronger and more effective central governing apparatus. Even the challenges presented by religious establishments decreased leading up to the early fifteenth century, due in part to growing Ashikaga control over sectarian hierarchies through the strategic placement of shogunal offspring into positions of temple leadership.81 Before becoming the eighth shogun in 1428, for example, Ashikaga Yoshinori himself had attained the lofty post of supreme abbot (zasu) of the Tendai sect on Mount Hiei. While the Ashikaga are well known for delegating authority over the provinces to their appointed deputies (shugo), the kind of full-spectrum dominance they came to enjoy in and around Kyoto resulted in a political and urban landscape more unified and centralized than it had been since perhaps the eighth-century reign of Emperor Kanmu.

Within this context, there was a further evolution in the discourse of capital space. Two centuries earlier, the distinction between Rakuchu and Rakugai had served to insulate a core portion of the city and assert the continued viability of capital institutions. In the late fourteenth century, however, as power became increasingly consolidated, the issue of exclusion became less relevant. No longer was it necessary to clearly define spheres of autonomy and jurisdiction in an environment in which the shogunate—now firmly based in Kyoto and functioning in unison with the imperial and religious establishments—had become the undisputed hegemon both within the capital and beyond. Such a

Circumstance helps explain why, from about the last decade of the fourteenth century, a wide variety of official documents began referring to the areas of Rakuchu and Rakugai as if in the same breath. Combined into a single compound word, “Rakuchu-Rakugai” became the most commonly used signifier for the capital basin, a broad area where taxes, policies, and central governance applied (more or less) uniformly.82

The rise of shogunal power had been made possible, in part, by the Ashikaga’s demonstrated respect for traditional capital norms. After all, protecting the capital and its institutions was, ostensibly, the military regime’s raison d’etre. Early on, such protection meant upholding the principles of capital exclusion by defending Rakuchu from the many and various invaders it faced, including rioting sectarians, rebellious warriors, and even rival claimants to the throne. Ashikaga shoguns went so far as to limit their own presence and prerogatives within Kyoto. Once the various threats were eliminated, however, capital institutions could return to an earlier status whereby they exercised direct control over an area that, although not the entire country, was much broader than the narrow confines of Rakuchu. The composition of capital institutions, however, had changed profoundly in the interim. Endowed with imperial ranks and posts as well as with the infrastructure necessary to engage in ritualized pageantry, the leaders of the warrior regime had infiltrated and co-opted the statutory state. In sum, Ashikaga shoguns had come to engender “capital authority” and in that capacity had greatly consolidated and expanded “Kyoto’s” political reach.