Page 60 - JAPAN THE SHAPING OFDAIMYO CULTURE 1185-1868

Daimyo and art

YOSHIAKI SHIMIZU

O

NIGHT
TWENTY-EIGHTH
THE
N
THE
the
twelfth
day
of
the
which
fourth of year of OF Jishô, month corres-
ponds to 1180, the sky over Nara, the
ancient capital of Japan and center of
old Buddhism, turned red. Daibutsuden, the Great Buddha Hall of To-
daiji, was burning. Taira Kiyomori (1118-1181), the head of the Taira war-
rior clan (Heike) and Prime Minister who controlled the imperial house
and court, had sent his son Shigehira (1156-1184), to confront the hostile
monks of Tôdaiji and Kófukuji, who were sympathetic to the rival Mina-
moto clan (Genji). Shigehira's men set fire to houses along the roads
approaching the monasteries, and eventually to the buildings within.
Some 1,700 women, children, and elderly who had sought refuge in the
Great Buddha Hall were engulfed by the raging fire and swirling smoke.
The head of the colossal bronze Buddha, thirty-two meters high, and
then the huge wooden hall, crashed to the ground. The nearby monas-
tery of Kôfukuji met the same fate. Miraculously, the Shôsôin, which
housed the imperial art collection amassed by the eighth-century em-
peror Shómu (701-756) and which stood only a few hundred yards behind
the Great Buddha Hall, survived.
Since the founding of Tôdaiji in the mid-eighth century, the
Great Buddha and its hall had been symbols of Japanese Buddhism,
which had been supported by the imperial court. The court was now
devastated by the loss of the great edifices, inestimable Buddhist icons,
and treasures housed within the monasteries. The imperial treasury was
empty and its power eroded. There was little reason to expect the Heike
usurpers to channel resources into rebuilding Tôdaiji and Kôfukuji. Not
until Minamoto Yoritomo (1147-1199), given a mandate by the former

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