East Asian Traders and Multiethnic Kings: The Lost History of Ōuchi Rule in Japan (1350-1569)
This lecture traces the history of the Ōuchi, an immigrant family from western Japan, and explores how they amassed power and influence from the fourteenth through the mid-sixteenth centuries. The Ōuchi family were kings in all but name who oversaw extensive trade with the continent, while their city of Yamaguchi functioned as an important regional entrepôt. They established an ethnic identity, claiming descent from Korean kings, and these assertions helped facilitate close ties with Korea. Under their rule, the political and economic core of Japan migrated from the capital to the western tip of Honshu during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, although this region suffered eclipse in the aftermath of the Ōuchi collapse.