Northern Court (Japan)

The Northern Court (北朝, hokuchō^?), also known as the "Ashikaga Pretenders" or "Northern Pretenders", were a set of six pretenders to the throne of Japan during the Nanboku-chō period from 1336 through 1392. The present Japanese Imperial Family is descended of the Northern Court emperors.

The Northern dynasty is also referred to as the "senior line" or the Jimyōin line (持明院統, Jimyōin-tō^?); Jimyō-in was a temple and retirement residence of this line's emperors Go-Fukakusa and Fushimi.

The origins of the Northern Court go back to Emperor Go-Saga, who reigned from 1242 through 1246. Go-Saga was succeeded in turn by two of his sons, Emperor Go-Fukakusa and Emperor Kameyama. On his death bed in 1272, Go-Saga insisted that his sons adopt a plan in which future emperors from the two fraternal lines would ascend the throne in alternating succession. This plan proved to be unworkable, resulting in rival factions and rival claimants to the throne.

In 1333, when the Southern Emperor Go-Daigo staged the Kemmu Restoration and revolted against the Hojo Kamakura shogunate, the newly minted Shōgun Ashikaga Takauji (ironically, by Emperor Go-Daigo himself) responded by declaring Emperor Kōgon, Go-Daigo's second cousin once removed and the son of an earlier emperor, Emperor Go-Fushimi of the Jimyōin-tō, as the new emperor. After the destruction of the Kamakura shogunate in 1333, Kōgon lost his claim, but his brother, Emperor Kōmyō, and two of his sons were supported by the new Ashikaga shoguns as the rightful claimants to the throne. Kōgon's family thus formed an alternate Imperial Court in Kyoto, which came to be called the Northern Court because its seat was in a location north of its rival. Cloistered Emperor Go-Daigo failed to control succession to the Imperial throne, whereby the Ashikaga Shoguns were able to wrestle any remaining power away from position of Emperor. Shoguns would rule Japan unimpeded until 1867.

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