View source for Imperial Court in Kyoto

{{Expand Japanese|topic=mil|朝廷 (日本)|date=September 2025}}
{{Short description|Nominal government of Japan from 794 to the late 19th century; true power held by shoguns}}
{{refimprove|date=May 2025}}
{{Daijō-kan}}
[[File:Kyotopalace.jpg|thumb|left|Front view of [[Kyoto Imperial Palace]]]]

The '''Imperial Court in [[Kyoto]]''' was the nominal ruling [[government of Japan]] from 794 AD until the [[Meiji period]] (1868–1912), after which the court was moved from [[Kyoto]] (formerly [[Heian-kyō]]) to [[Tokyo]] (formerly [[Edo]]) and integrated into the [[Meiji government]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Tiedemann |first=Arthur |title=Sources of Japanese Tradition |publisher=Columbia University Press |year=2002 |isbn=9780231121392 |edition=2 |pages=66–123 |language=en}}</ref> Upon the court being moved to Kyoto from Nagaoka by [[Emperor Kanmu]] (737–806),<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last=Tseng |first=Alice Y. |date=2012 |title=The Retirement of Kyoto as Imperial Capital |url=http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1179/cou.2012.17.2.005 |journal=The Court Historian |language=en |volume=17 |issue=2 |pages=209–223 |doi=10.1179/cou.2012.17.2.005 |s2cid=154618669 |issn=1462-9712 |via=Taylor & Francis Online|url-access=subscription }}</ref> the struggles for power regarding the throne that had characterized the [[Nara period]] diminished.<ref name=":0" /> Kyoto was selected as the location for the court because of its "proper" amount of rivers and mountains which were believed to be the most auspicious surroundings for the new capital.<ref name=":0" /> The capital itself was built in imitation of [[Chang'an]], the Chinese capital of the [[Tang dynasty]], closely following the theories of [[Yin and yang|yin-yang]].<ref name=":0" /> The most prominent group of people within the court was the civil aristocracy ([[kuge]]) which was the ruling class of society that exercised power on behalf of the emperor.<ref>{{Citation |last=Lau |first=Wai |title=Scenes of Life in the Imperial Court Society in Kyoto |date=2022 |url=https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-11424-3_12 |work=On the Process of Civilisation in Japan: Sociogenetic and Psychogenetic Investigations |series=Palgrave Studies on Norbert Elias |pages=185–215 |editor-last=Lau |editor-first=Wai |place=Cham |publisher=Springer International Publishing |language=en |doi=10.1007/978-3-031-11424-3_12 |isbn=978-3-031-11424-3 |access-date=|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Kyoto's identity as a political, economic, and cultural centre started to be challenged in the post-1185 era with the rise of the shogunate system which gradually seized governance from the emperor.<ref name=":1" /> [[Minamoto no Yoritomo]] was the first to establish the post of the shōgun as hereditary, receiving the title in 1192.<ref name=":2">{{Cite book |date=2018-04-19 |chapter-url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9780429499531-20/kamakura-shogunate-beginnings-warrior-power-andrew-edmund-goble |language=en |pages=189–199 |doi=10.4324/9780429499531-20|last1=Goble |first1=Andrew Edmund |title=Japan Emerging |chapter=The Kamakura Shogunate and the Beginnings of Warrior Power |isbn=9780429499531 }}</ref> After Yoritomo launched the shogunate, true political power was in the hand of the ''[[Shogun|shōguns]]'', who were mistaken several times for the [[Emperor of Japan|emperors of Japan]] by representatives of Western countries. The [[Kamakura shogunate]] (or Kamakura bakufu) would go on to last for almost 150 years, from 1185 to 1333.<ref name=":2" />

==See also==
*[[Five regent houses]]
*[[Heian Palace]]
*[[Kyoto Gosho]]

== References ==
<references />

==Further reading==
{{refbegin}}
* Ackroyd, Joyce. (1982). [ [[Arai Hakuseki]], 1712] ''[[Tokushi Yoron]]''; "Lessons from History: the Tokushi yoron" translated by Joynce Ackroyd. Brisbane: University of Queensland Press. {{ISBN|0-7022-1485-X}}
* {{in lang|ja}} Asai T. (1985). ''Nyokan Tūkai''. Tokyo: [[Kōdansha]].
* Brown, Delmer and Ichiro Ishida, eds. (1979). [ [[Jien]], c. 1220],  ''[[Gukanshō]]; "The Future and the Past: a translation and study of the 'Gukanshō', an interpretive history of Japan written in 1219" translated from the Japanese and edited by Delmer M. Brown & Ichirō Ishida''. Berkeley: [[University of California Press]].  {{ISBN|0-520-03460-0}}
* [[Yukio Ozaki|Ozaki]], Yukio. (2001). ''The Autobiography of Ozaki Yukio: The Struggle for Constitutional Government in Japan''. [Translated by Fujiko Hara]. Princeton: [[Princeton University Press]]. {{ISBN|0-691-05095-3}} (cloth)
* {{in lang|ja}} Ozaki, Yukio. (1955). ''Ozak Gakudō Zenshū''. Tokyo: Kōronsha.
* [[George Bailey Sansom|Sansom]], George (1958). ''A History of Japan to 1334''. Stanford: [[Stanford University Press]]. {{ISBN|0-8047-0523-2}}
* Sansom, George. (1952). ''Japan: A Short Cultural History''. Stanford: [[Stanford University Press]].  {{ISBN|978-0-8047-0952-1}} (cloth) {{ISBN|978-0-8047-0954-5}} (paper)
* [[Timon Screech|Screech]], Timon. (2006). ''Secret Memoirs of the Shoguns:  Isaac Titsingh and Japan, 1779–1822''. London: [[RoutledgeCurzon]]. {{ISBN|0-7007-1720-X}}
* [[Isaac Titsingh|Titsingh]], Isaac. (1834). [Siyun-sai Rin-siyo/[[Hayashi Gahō]], 1652], ''[[Nipon o daï itsi ran]]; ou, Annales des empereurs du Japon, tr. par M. Isaac Titsingh avec l'aide de plusieurs interprètes attachés au comptoir hollandais de Nangasaki; ouvrage re., complété et cor. sur l'original japonais-chinois, accompagné de notes et précédé d'un Aperçu d'histoire mythologique du Japon, par M. J. [[Julius Klaproth|Klaproth]]''.  Paris: [[Royal Asiatic Society|Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland]].[https://books.google.com/books?id=18oNAAAAIAAJ&dq=nipon+o+dai+itsi+ran ...Click link to digitized, full-text copy of this book (in French)]
* Ury, Marian.  (1999). "Chinese Learning and Intellectual Life", ''The Cambridge history of Japan: Heian Japan''. Vol. II. Cambridge: [[Cambridge University Press]]. {{ISBN|978-0-521-22353-9}} (cloth)
* Varley, H. Paul, ed. (1980). [ [[Kitabatake Chikafusa]], 1359], ''[[Jinnō Shōtōki]] ("A Chronicle of Gods and Sovereigns: Jinnō Shōtōki of Kitabatake Chikafusa" translated by H. Paul Varley)''. New York: [[Columbia University Press]].  {{ISBN|0-231-04940-4}}
{{refend}}

{{coord missing|Kyoto Prefecture}}

[[Category:Japanese monarchy]]
[[Category:Japanese imperial court]]
[[Category:Former capitals of Japan]]
[[Category:History of Kyoto]]

[[ja:京都御所]]