That the shogun, Yoshihisa, and his successor, Yoshitane, turned
their weapons so resolutely against this magnate was due to a cause
illustrative of the abuses of the era. From the outset the Ashikaga
sway over the provinces had been a vanishing quantity, and had
disappeared almost entirely during the Onin War. Not alone did the
writ of the sovereign or the shogun cease to run in regions outside
Kyoto and its immediate vicinity, but also the taxes, though duly
collected, did not find their way to the coffers of either Muromachi
or the Court. Shugo there still existed, and jito and kokushi; but
neither high constable nor land-steward nor civil governor acted as
practical representative of any Central Government: each functioned
for his own hand, swallowing up for his own use, or for inclusion in
some local fief, the manors which had once been the property of the
State or of the Court nobility.

It was evidently of prime necessity from the Muromachi point of view
that a state of affairs which crippled the shogun by impoverishing
him should be remedied. Sasaki Takayori, head of the Rokkaku house,
was a conspicuous product of his time. He had seized the manors of
nearly fifty landowners in the province of Omi, and to punish his
aggressions signally would furnish a useful object lesson. That was
done effectually by Yoshitane's generals, and Sasaki had to flee from
Omi. But the young shogun's triumph was short lived. He allowed
himself to be drawn by Hatakeyama Masanaga into a private feud. We
have already seen this Masanaga engaged with Yoshinari in a struggle
for the Hatakeyama succession on the eve of the Onin War. Yoshinari
was no longer alive, but he had bequeathed to his son, Yoshitoyo, a
heritage of resentment against Masanaga, and the latter, who now held
the post of kwanryo for the fourth time, induced the shogun to order
an attack upon Yoshitoyo in the provinces of Kii and Kawachi. But
Yoshitoyo managed to enlist the aid of the recently discomfited
Sasaki, of the soldier-monks of Kofuku-ji, and, above all, of
Hosokawa Masamoto, son of Hatakeyama Masanaga's old opponent,
Hosokawa Katsumoto. With these co-operated the Yamana, the Isshiki,
and other septs, so that Yoshitane found himself between two powerful
armies, one in Kyoto, the other in Kii. In the sequel, Masanaga
committed suicide, and the shogun, Yoshitane, escaped to Suwo.

YOSHIZUMI AND YOSHIHARU

Hosokawa Masamoto was now master of the situation in Kyoto