In January 1703, Japan was just days away from celebrating a century of Tokugawa rule when an incident broke out that threatened to throw the entire system into doubt. After years of waiting in the shadows, a group of samurai emerged from hiding to strike down the man responsible for their lord’s death. The act put the Tokugawa in an impossibly awkward situation, casting an ugly light on the hypocrisy of the warrior code underpinning their authority.
Two years earlier, in 1701, Japan had been enjoying a period of hitherto unknown peace and prosperity after years of bloodshed and chaos. After completing the unification of Japan, the Tokugawa had brought an end to perpetual warfare, ushering in a new era of obsessive control. Although the country remained under the rule of a military dictator – the shōgun – and the samurai still reigned supreme over the merchant, artisan and peasant classes, peace had turned warriors into aristocrats.
Stephen Turnbull, an expert on Japanese history, describes how a “cosmopolitan culture” flourished in the capital Edo (Tokyo) as the economy flourished. Reflecting on the times, Turnbull explains: “While on duty there, a samurai’s display of redundant military might concealed the state of genteel poverty into which many of them
