Japanese History · Chronicle IX of XI
明治 · The Restoration
Japan's headlong modernization: the fall of the samurai, a constitution and victory over Russia.
The Meiji RestorationPolitical
Reformers restore the emperor and pledge in the Charter Oath to seek knowledge throughout the world.
The young leaders who ruled in Meiji's name set out to save Japan by transforming it. The Charter Oath promised deliberative assemblies and an end to old customs, and the court moved to Edo, renamed Tokyo, the "eastern capital." Their slogan — "rich country, strong army" — would drive a generation of breakneck change.
Remaking the StatePolitical
The feudal domains are abolished and replaced by prefectures, and the Iwakura Mission sails to study the West.
In a single stroke the daimyō surrendered their lands, and the map of feudal Japan gave way to a centralized state of prefectures and governors. That same era saw universal conscription, a national land tax and compulsory schooling, while a great embassy toured Europe and America to learn the secrets of their power.
The Last SamuraiMilitary
Saigō Takamori leads a last samurai revolt, crushed by the new conscript army of the modern state.
Stripped of their stipends, their swords and their monopoly on arms, many samurai felt betrayed by the revolution they had made. When Saigō, a hero of the Restoration, led Satsuma's warriors in revolt, the peasant conscripts of the imperial army defeated them decisively. The old warrior class passed into history and legend.
The ConstitutionPolitical
Japan adopts a written constitution and an elected Diet, becoming the first constitutional state in Asia.
Modelled on Prussia, the constitution granted by the emperor created a parliament, the Diet, while keeping sovereignty in the throne and real power with an oligarchy of statesmen. Limited though it was, it gave Japan the forms of a modern nation-state and a framework of law admired and feared across the region.
The First Sino-Japanese WarMilitary
Japan's modern forces defeat Qing China, winning Taiwan and announcing the arrival of a new power in Asia.
A quarrel over Korea brought war with the ancient empire of China — and Japan's new navy and army won a swift, crushing victory. The peace gave Japan Taiwan and a huge indemnity, though Western powers forced it to disgorge some gains. In a generation, the once-threatened islands had become the rising power of the East.
The Russo-Japanese WarMilitary
At Tsushima the Japanese fleet annihilates a Russian armada — the first modern defeat of a Western empire by an Asian power.
War with Russia over Manchuria and Korea was decided by the siege of Port Arthur and, at sea, by Admiral Tōgō's near-total destruction of the Russian Baltic Fleet at Tsushima. Japan's victory stunned the world, inspired colonized peoples from India to Egypt, and confirmed the empire as a great power to be reckoned with.
The End of an EraPolitical
The Meiji emperor dies, mourned as the sovereign under whom Japan rose from seclusion to world power.
In forty-four years Japan had gained an empire, an industry and a constitution, and had annexed Korea in 1910. The emperor's death closed that heroic age of transformation. The general Nogi, hero of Port Arthur, followed his lord in ritual suicide — a startling gesture that captured a nation poised uneasily between old spirit and new power.
