26. A Slimy Samurai
Ashikaga Takauji (1305 – 1358) was a Japanese warrior, general, and somewhat slimy statesman whose life and career featured numerous twists and turns, during which Takauji switched sides multiple times. In the end, he rose to become shogun, or military dictator, and founded the Ashikaga Shogunate at age 33, which dominated Japan for nearly two and a half centuries. Takauji began his career in service to the powerful Hojo clan, which ran Japan’s then-Kamakura Shogunate. In 1333, the Hojos tasked him to end a civil war against Japan’s figurehead emperor. He came to dislike the Hojos, however, and switched sides. He joined the emperor, and with Takauji’s help, the Hojos were defeated and compelled to commit suicide, ending the Kamakura Shogunate.
The emperor was restored to power, and established the first imperial government that wielded both military and political power since the tenth century. For his troubles, however, Takauji was rewarded with an accusation of having murdered an imperial prince while campaigning. He responded by switching sides once again, and turning on the emperor whom he had only recently restored to the throne. He defeated the emperor, reduced him once again to a figurehead, assumed the military dictatorship of Japan, and founded the Ashikaga Shogunate which ruled the country from 1338 to 1573.
