Kabane
Kabane (
History
[edit]At first, the kabane were administered by individual clans, but eventually they came to be controlled by the Yamato imperial court. As the court's national unification efforts progressed, a kabane was given to the most powerful families, which gradually became a hereditary noble title, and new ones were created. There were almost thirty of them in number.[2] Some of the more common kabane were Omi (
Descendants of the Imperial House of Japan (
The imperial House of Yamato became the most powerful family in the kabane system, although during the 6th century AD, a number of other leaders, often with high ranks of Omi and Muraji, sometimes overshadowed the Yamato rulers.[3] This power dynamic became one of the incentives of the Taika Reform in 684.[4]
During this reform, the kabane was no longer tied to a specific occupation or political position, but simply began to signify a family's aristocratic lineage and social status.[1] The existing kabane were also reorganized into an eight-kabane system eight kabane system (
Later, as the clans began to devolve into individual households, the kabane system gradually faded from use.
Name
[edit]
It is generally believed that the name kabane (
References
[edit]- ^ a b c Encyclopedia Nipponica. Japan: Shogakkan. 2001. Kabane. ISBN 409526117X.
- ^ a b c d Gibney, Frank (1995). Britannica International Encyclopaedia. Japan: TBS-BRITANNICA. Kabane. OCLC 55231838.
- ^ "Kabane | Japanese society". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 2020-06-02.
- ^ Hane, Mikiso; Perez, Louis G. (2014). Premodern Japan: a Historical Survey. (Second edition ed.). Boulder, CO. ISBN 978-0-8133-4970-1.