1.
Akira Kurosawa
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Akira Kurosawa was a Japanese filmmaker. Regarded as one of the most important and influential filmmakers in the history of cinema, Kurosawa entered the Japanese film industry in 1936, following a brief stint as a painter. After years of working on films as an assistant director and scriptwriter, he made his debut as a director in 1943, during World War II. The two men would go on to collaborate on another 15 films, Kurosawas wife, Yōko Yaguchi, was also an actress in one of his films. Throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, Kurosawa directed approximately a film a year, including a number of highly regarded films such as Ikiru, Seven Samurai, in 1990, he accepted the Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement. Kurosawa was born on March 23,1910 in Ōimachi in the district of Tokyo. In addition to promoting physical exercise, Isamu Kurosawa was open to western traditions and considered theater and he encouraged his children to watch films, young Akira viewed his first movies at the age of six. During this time, the boy also studied calligraphy and Kendo swordsmanship, another major childhood influence was Heigo Kurosawa, Akiras older brother by four years. In the aftermath of the Great Kantō earthquake of 1923, which devastated Tokyo, some commentators have suggested that this incident would influence Kurosawas later artistic career, as the director was seldom hesitant to confront unpleasant truths in his work. In the late 1920s, Heigo became a benshi for Tokyo theaters showing foreign films, Akira, who at this point planned to become a painter, moved in with him, and the two brothers became inseparable. Through Heigo, Akira devoured not only films but also theater and circus performances, while exhibiting his paintings, with the increasing production of talking pictures in the early 1930s, film narrators like Heigo began to lose work, and Akira moved back in with his parents. In July 1933, Heigo committed suicide, only four months later, Kurosawas eldest brother also died, leaving Akira, at age 23, the only one of the Kurosawa brothers still living, together with his three surviving sisters. In 1935, the new film studio Photo Chemical Laboratories, known as P. C. L and his half-mocking view was that if the deficiencies were fundamental, there was no way to correct them. Kurosawas essay earned him a call to take the exams, and director Kajirō Yamamoto. The 25-year-old Kurosawa joined P. C. L. in February 1936, during his five years as an assistant director, Kurosawa worked under numerous directors, but by far the most important figure in his development was Kajiro Yamamoto. Of his 24 films as A. D. he worked on 17 under Yamamoto, many of them featuring the popular actor Kenichi Enomoto. Yamamoto nurtured Kurosawas talent, promoting him directly from third assistant director to assistant director after a year. In the last of Kurosawas films as an assistant director, Horse, Kurosawa took over most of the production, One important piece of advice Yamamoto gave Kurosawa was that a good director needed to master screenwriting
2.
Japan
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Japan is a sovereign island nation in Eastern Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asia Mainland and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea, the kanji that make up Japans name mean sun origin. 日 can be read as ni and means sun while 本 can be read as hon, or pon, Japan is often referred to by the famous epithet Land of the Rising Sun in reference to its Japanese name. Japan is an archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands. The four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu and Shikoku, the country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions. Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one, the population of 127 million is the worlds tenth largest. Japanese people make up 98. 5% of Japans total population, approximately 9.1 million people live in the city of Tokyo, the capital of Japan. Archaeological research indicates that Japan was inhabited as early as the Upper Paleolithic period, the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD. Influence from other regions, mainly China, followed by periods of isolation, from the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shoguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a period of isolation in the early 17th century. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan is a member of the UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the country has the worlds third-largest economy by nominal GDP and the worlds fourth-largest economy by purchasing power parity. It is also the worlds fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer, although Japan has officially renounced its right to declare war, it maintains a modern military with the worlds eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a country with a very high standard of living. Its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and the third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, in ancient China, Japan was called Wo 倭. It was mentioned in the third century Chinese historical text Records of the Three Kingdoms in the section for the Wei kingdom, Wa became disliked because it has the connotation of the character 矮, meaning dwarf. The 倭 kanji has been replaced with the homophone Wa, meaning harmony, the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, which is pronounced Nippon or Nihon and literally means the origin of the sun. The earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, at the start of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan introduced their country as Nihon
3.
20th Century Fox
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Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation is an American film studio currently owned by 21st Century Fox. It is one of the Big Six major American film studios and is located in the Century City area of Los Angeles, the studio was formerly owned by News Corporation. 20th Century Fox is a member of the Motion Picture Association of America, in 2015, 20th Century Fox celebrated its 80th anniversary as a studio. Spyros Skouras, then manager of the Fox West Coast Theaters, the studios biggest star, Will Rogers, died in a plane crash weeks after the merger. Its leading female star, Janet Gaynor, was fading in popularity and promising leading men James Dunn, at first, it was expected that the new company was originally to be called Fox-20th Century, even though 20th Century was the senior partner in the merger. However, 20th Century brought more to the bargaining table besides Schenck and Zanuck, the new company, 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation, began trading on May 31,1935, the hyphen was dropped in 1985. Schenck became Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, while Kent remained as President, Zanuck became Vice President in Charge of Production, replacing Foxs longtime production chief Winfield Sheehan. The company established a training school. The contracts included an option for renewal for as long as seven years. For many years, 20th Century Fox claimed to have founded in 1915. For instance, it marked 1945 as its 30th anniversary, however, in recent years it has claimed the 1935 merger as its founding, even though most film historians agree it was founded in 1915. The companys films retained the 20th Century Pictures searchlight logo on their credits as well as its opening fanfare. Also on the Fox payroll he found two players who he built up into the studios leading assets, Alice Faye and seven-year-old Shirley Temple, favoring popular biographies and musicals, Zanuck built Fox back to profitability. Thanks to record attendance during World War II, Fox overtook RKO, while Zanuck went off for eighteen months war service, junior partner William Goetz kept profits high by going for light entertainment. The studios—indeed the industrys—biggest star was creamy blonde Betty Grable, in 1942, Spyros Skouras succeeded Kent as president of the studio. Together with Zanuck, who returned in 1943, they intended to make Foxs output more serious-minded. During the next few years, with pictures like The Razors Edge, Wilson, Gentlemans Agreement, The Snake Pit, Boomerang, and Pinky, Zanuck established a reputation for provocative, adult films. Fox also specialized in adaptations of best-selling books such as Ben Ames Williams Leave Her to Heaven, starring Gene Tierney and they also made the 1958 film version of South Pacific
4.
Japanese yen
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The yen is the official currency of Japan. It is the third most traded currency in the exchange market after the United States dollar. It is also used as a reserve currency after the U. S. dollar, the euro. Before the Meiji Restoration, Japans feudal fiefs all issued their own money, hansatsu, in an array of incompatible denominations. The New Currency Act of 1871 did away with these and established the yen, the former han became prefectures and their mints private chartered banks, which initially retained the right to print money. To bring an end to this situation the Bank of Japan was founded in 1882, following World War II the yen lost much of its prewar value. To stabilize the Japanese economy the exchange rate of the yen was fixed at ¥360 per $1 as part of the Bretton Woods system, when that system was abandoned in 1971, the yen became undervalued and was allowed to float. The yen had appreciated to a peak of ¥271 per $1 in 1973, then underwent periods of depreciation and appreciation due to the 1973 oil crisis, arriving at a value of ¥227 per $1 by 1980. Since 1973, the Japanese government has maintained a policy of intervention. The Japanese government focuses on an export market, and tries to ensure a low yen value through a trade surplus. Since that time, however, the yen has greatly decreased in value, the Bank of Japan maintains a policy of zero to near-zero interest rates and the Japanese government has an extreme anti-inflation policy. Yen derives from the Japanese word 圓, which is cognate with the Chinese yuan, originally, the Chinese had traded silver in mass called sycees and when Spanish and Mexican silver coins arrived, the Chinese called them silver rounds for their circular shapes. The coins and the name appeared in Japan. While the Chinese eventually replaced 圓 with 元, the Japanese continued to use the same word, the spelling and pronunciation yen is standard in English. This is because mainly English speakers who visited Japan at the end of the Edo period to the early Meiji period spelled words this way, ゑん /wen/ in historical kana orthography. In the 16th century, Japanese /e/ and /we/ both had been pronounced and Portuguese missionaries had spelled them ye, some time thereafter, by the middle of the 18th century, /e/ and /we/ came to be pronounced as in modern Japanese, although some regions retain the pronunciation. In the early Meiji era, James Curtis Hepburn, following Medhurst, spelled all es as ye in his A Japanese and that was the first full-scale Japanese-English/English-Japanese dictionary, which had a strong influence on Westerners in Japan and probably prompted the spelling yen. Hepburn revised most of yes to e in the 3rd edition in order to mirror the contemporary pronunciation and this was probably already fixed and has remained so ever since
5.
United States dollar
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The United States dollar is the official currency of the United States and its insular territories per the United States Constitution. It is divided into 100 smaller cent units, the circulating paper money consists of Federal Reserve Notes that are denominated in United States dollars. The U. S. dollar was originally commodity money of silver as enacted by the Coinage Act of 1792 which determined the dollar to be 371 4/16 grain pure or 416 grain standard silver, the currency most used in international transactions, it is the worlds primary reserve currency. Several countries use it as their currency, and in many others it is the de facto currency. Besides the United States, it is used as the sole currency in two British Overseas Territories in the Caribbean, the British Virgin Islands and Turks and Caicos Islands. A few countries use the Federal Reserve Notes for paper money, while the country mints its own coins, or also accepts U. S. coins that can be used as payment in U. S. dollars. After Nixon shock of 1971, USD became fiat currency, Article I, Section 8 of the U. S. Constitution provides that the Congress has the power To coin money, laws implementing this power are currently codified at 31 U. S. C. Section 5112 prescribes the forms in which the United States dollars should be issued and these coins are both designated in Section 5112 as legal tender in payment of debts. The Sacagawea dollar is one example of the copper alloy dollar, the pure silver dollar is known as the American Silver Eagle. Section 5112 also provides for the minting and issuance of other coins and these other coins are more fully described in Coins of the United States dollar. The Constitution provides that a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and that provision of the Constitution is made specific by Section 331 of Title 31 of the United States Code. The sums of money reported in the Statements are currently being expressed in U. S. dollars, the U. S. dollar may therefore be described as the unit of account of the United States. The word dollar is one of the words in the first paragraph of Section 9 of Article I of the Constitution, there, dollars is a reference to the Spanish milled dollar, a coin that had a monetary value of 8 Spanish units of currency, or reales. In 1792 the U. S. Congress passed a Coinage Act, Section 20 of the act provided, That the money of account of the United States shall be expressed in dollars, or units. And that all accounts in the offices and all proceedings in the courts of the United States shall be kept and had in conformity to this regulation. In other words, this act designated the United States dollar as the unit of currency of the United States, unlike the Spanish milled dollar the U. S. dollar is based upon a decimal system of values. Both one-dollar coins and notes are produced today, although the form is significantly more common
6.
Jidaigeki
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Jidaigeki is a genre of film, television, video game, and theatre in Japan. Literally meaning period dramas, they are most often set during the Edo period of Japanese history, some, however, are set much earlier—Portrait of Hell, for example, is set during the late Heian period—and the early Meiji era is also a popular setting. Jidaigeki show the lives of the samurai, farmers, craftsmen, Jidaigeki films are sometimes referred to as chambara movies, a word meaning sword fight, though chambara is more accurately a subgenre of jidaigeki. Jidaigeki rely on a set of dramatic conventions including the use of makeup, language, catchphrases. Many jidaigeki take place in Edo, the military capital, others show the adventures of people wandering from place to place. The long-running television series Zenigata Heiji and Abarenbō Shōgun typify the Edo jidaigeki, Mito Kōmon, the fictitious story of the travels of the historical daimyo Tokugawa Mitsukuni, and the Zatoichi movies and television series, exemplify the traveling style. Another way to categorize jidaigeki is according to the status of the principal characters. The title character of Abarenbō Shogun is Tokugawa Yoshimune, the eighth Tokugawa shogun, the head of the samurai class, Yoshimune assumes the disguise of a low-ranking hatamoto, a samurai in the service of the shogun. Similarly, Mito Kōmon is the retired vice-shogun, masquerading as a merchant, in contrast, the coin-throwing Heiji of Zenigata Heiji is a commoner, working for the police, while Ichi, a blind masseur, is an outcast, as were many disabled people in that era. In fact, masseurs, who typically were at the bottom of the food chain, was one of the few vocational positions available to the blind in that era. Gokenin Zankurō is a samurai but, due to his low rank and income, whether the lead role is samurai or commoner, jidaigeki usually reach a climax in an immense sword fight just before the end. The title character of a series always wins, whether using a sword or a jutte, sengoku-jidai is a Japanese genre that has been used as the setting for novels, films, video games, anime and manga. It bears some parallels with the Western, Akira Kurosawas Seven Samurai, among the characters in jidaigeki are a parade of people with occupations unfamiliar to modern Japanese, and especially to foreigners. The warrior class included samurai, hereditary members in the service of a daimyo or the shogun. Ronin, samurai without masters, were warriors, and like samurai. Bugeisha were men, or in some women, who aimed to perfect their martial arts. Ninja were the service, specializing in stealth, the use of disguises, explosives. Craftsmen in jidaigeki included metalworkers, bucket-makers, carpenters and plasterers, in addition to the owners of businesses large and small, the jidaigeki often portray the employees
7.
History of Japan
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It is widely accepted that first Human habitation in the Japanese archipelago traced back to prehistoric times. The Jōmon period, named after its cord-marked pottery, was followed by the Yayoi in the first millennium BC, during this period, in the first century AD, the first known written reference to Japan was recorded in the Chinese Book of Han. Between the fourth century and the century, Japans many kingdoms and tribes gradually came to be unified under a centralized government. The imperial dynasty established at this time continues to reign over Japan to this day, in 794, a new imperial capital was established at Heian-kyō, marking the beginning of the Heian period, which lasted until 1185. The Heian period is considered an age of classical Japanese culture. Japanese religious life from time and onwards was a mix of Buddhism. Over the following centuries the power of the Emperor and the imperial court gradually declined and passed to the military clans, the Minamoto clan under Minamoto no Yoritomo emerged victorious from the Genpei War of 1180–85. After seizing power, Yoritomo set up his capital in Kamakura, in 1274 and 1281, the Kamakura shogunate withstood two Mongol invasions, but in 1333 it was toppled by a rival claimant to the shogunate, ushering in the Muromachi period. During the Muromachi period regional warlords called daimyō grew in power at the expense of the shogun, eventually, Japan descended into a period of civil war. Over the course of the sixteenth century, Japan was reunified under the leadership of the daimyō Oda Nobunaga. After Hideyoshis death in 1598, Tokugawa Ieyasu came to power and was appointed shogun by the Emperor, the Tokugawa shogunate, which governed from Edo, presided over a prosperous and peaceful era known as the Edo period. The Tokugawa shogunate imposed a strict class system on Japanese society, the American Perry Expedition in 1853–54 ended Japans seclusion, this in turn contributed to the fall of the shogunate and the return of power to the Emperor in 1868. The new national leadership of the following Meiji period transformed their isolated, underdeveloped island country into an empire that closely followed Western models and became a world power. Although democracy developed and modern civilian culture prospered during the Taishō period, Japans powerful military had great autonomy, the military invaded Manchuria in 1931, and from 1937 the conflict escalated into a prolonged war with China. Japans attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 led to war with the United States, Japans forces soon became overextended, but the military held out in spite of Allied air attacks that inflicted severe damage on population centers. Japans unconditional surrender was announced by Emperor Hirohito on 14 August 1945 following the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Allies occupied Japan until 1952, during which a new constitution was enacted in 1947 that transformed Japan into a constitutional monarchy, after 1955, Japan enjoyed very high economic growth, and became a world economic powerhouse. Since the 1990s, economic stagnation has been a major issue, an earthquake and tsunami in 2011 caused massive economic dislocations and a serious nuclear power disaster
8.
Takeda Shingen
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Takeda Shingen, of Kai Province, was a pre-eminent daimyō in feudal Japan with exceptional military prestige in the late stage of the Sengoku period. Shingen was called Tarō or Katsuchiyo during his childhood, when he celebrated his coming of age, he was given the formal name Harunobu, which included a character from the name of Ashikaga Yoshiharu, the 12th Ashikaga Shogun. It was a practice in feudal Japan for a higher-ranked warrior to bestow a character from his own name to his inferiors as a symbol of recognition. From the local Lords perspective, it was an honour to receive a character from the shogunate, both the Ashikaga and the Takeda clans descended from the Minamoto clan. Technically, Harunobu, as well as his forefathers, had borne the surname of Minamoto, therefore, Harunobu would be referred to as Minamoto-no Harunobu in official records kept by the Imperial Court when he was conferred the official title of Daizen Dayu. The Imperial Court had maintained a system of ritsuryō that was parallel to the shogunate apparatus, in 1551 Harunobu chose to live a pabbajja life and received a dharma name, Shingen, from his Buddhist master. The kanji of Shingen can also be pronounced as Nobuharu, which is the inversion of his official name, in ancient times, such religious names of recognized Japanese aristocrats would be read in onyomi, the Chinese-style pronunciation, instead of kunyomi, the indigenous Japanese pronunciation. Although widely known by the name, Takeda Shingens formal name remained Harunobu throughout the rest of his life. Shingen is sometimes referred to as The Tiger of Kai for his prowess on the battlefield. His primary rival, Uesugi Kenshin, was often called The Dragon of Echigo or also The Tiger of Echigo and these two seemed to have enjoyed meeting in battle. They fought several times at Kawanakajima, Takeda Shingen was the first-born son of Takeda Nobutora, leader of the Takeda clan, and daimyō of the province of Kai. He had been a poet in his youth. He assisted his father with the relatives and vassals of the Takeda family. In 1536, at the age of 15, he was instrumental in helping his father win the Battle of Un no Kuchi, at some point in his life after his coming of age ceremony, the young man decided to rebel against Nobutora. He finally succeeded in 1540, successfully taking control of the clan, events regarding this change of leadership are not entirely clear, but it is thought that Nobutora had planned to name the second son, Nobushige, as his heir instead of Shingen. For their help in this coup, an alliance was formed between the Imagawa and the Takeda clans. Shingens first act was to gain a hold of the area around him and his goal was to conquer Shinano Province. However, planning to beat him down at Fuchu, they were unprepared when Takeda forces suddenly came down upon them at the Battle of Sezawa
9.
Crucifixion
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It is principally known from classical antiquity, but remains in occasional use in some countries. The crucifixion of Jesus is a narrative in Christianity. Ancient Greek has two verbs for crucify, ana-stauro, from stauros, stake, and apo-tumpanizo crucify on a plank, in earlier pre-Roman Greek texts anastauro usually means impale. New Testament Greek uses four verbs, three of them based upon stauros, usually translated cross, prospegnumi, to fix or fasten to, impale, crucify occurs only once at the Acts of the Apostles 2,23. The English term cross derives from the Latin word crux, the Latin term crux classically referred to a tree or any construction of wood used to hang criminals as a form of execution. The term later came to specifically to a cross. The English term crucifix derives from the Latin crucifixus or cruci fixus, past participle passive of crucifigere or cruci figere, Crucifixion was often performed in order to terrorize and dissuade its witnesses from perpetrating particularly heinous crimes. Victims were left on display after death as warnings to others who might attempt dissent, Crucifixion was usually intended to provide a death that was particularly slow, painful, gruesome, humiliating, and public, using whatever means were most expedient for that goal. Crucifixion methods varied considerably with location and time period, in some cases, the condemned was forced to carry the crossbeam to the place of execution. A whole cross would weigh well over 135 kg, but the crossbeam would not be quite as burdensome, weighing around 45 kg. Upright posts would presumably be fixed permanently in place. Objects used in the crucifixion of criminals, such as nails, were sought as amulets with perceived medicinal qualities, while a crucifixion was an execution, it was also a humiliation, by making the condemned as vulnerable as possible. Although artists have depicted the figure on a cross with a loin cloth or a covering of the genitals. Writings by Seneca the Younger state some victims suffered a stick forced upwards through their groin, despite its frequent use by the Romans, the horrors of crucifixion did not escape mention by some of their eminent orators. Frequently, the legs of the executed were broken or shattered with an iron club, an act called crurifragium. This act hastened the death of the person but was meant to deter those who observed the crucifixion from committing offenses. The gibbet on which crucifixion was carried out could be of many shapes, at times the gibbet was only one vertical stake, called in Latin crux simplex. This was the simplest available construction for torturing and killing the condemned, frequently, however, there was a cross-piece attached either at the top to give the shape of a T or just below the top, as in the form most familiar in Christian symbolism
10.
Tokugawa Ieyasu
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Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan, which effectively ruled Japan from the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Ieyasu seized power in 1600, received appointment as shogun in 1603, abdicated from office in 1605 and his given name is sometimes spelled Iyeyasu, according to the historical pronunciation of he. Ieyasu was posthumously enshrined at Nikkō Tōshō-gū with the name Tōshō Daigongen and he was one of the three unifiers of Japan, along with his Former Lord Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Tokugawa Ieyasu was born in Okazaki Castle in Mikawa on the 26th day of the month of the eleventh year of Tenbun. His mother and father were step-siblings and they were just 17 and 15 years old, respectively, when Ieyasu was born. Two years later, Odai-no-kata was sent back to her family, as both husband and wife remarried and both went on to have further children, Ieyasu in the end had 11 half-brothers and sisters. The Matsudaira family was split in 1550, one wanted to be vassals of the Imagawa clan. As a result, much of Ieyasus early years were spent in danger as wars with the Oda and this family feud was the reason behind the murder of Ieyasus paternal grandfather, Matsudaira Kiyoyasu. Unlike his father and the majority of his branch of the family, Ieyasus father, Hirotada, in 1548, when the Oda clan invaded Mikawa, Hirotada turned to Imagawa Yoshimoto, the head of the Imagawa clan, for help to repel the invaders. Yoshimoto agreed under the condition that Hirotada send Ieyasu to Sunpu as a hostage, Oda Nobuhide, the leader of the Oda clan, learned of this arrangement and had Ieyasu abducted from his entourage en route to Sunpu. Ieyasu was just five years old at the time, Nobuhide threatened to execute Ieyasu unless his father severed all ties with the Imagawa clan. Hirotada replied that sacrificing his own son would show his seriousness in his pact with the Imagawa clan, despite this refusal, Nobuhide chose not to kill Ieyasu, but instead held him for the next three years at the Mansho Temple in Nagoya. In 1549, when Ieyasu was 6, his father Hirotada was murdered by his own treacherous vassals, at about the same time, Oda Nobuhide died during an epidemic. Nobuhides death dealt a blow to the Oda clan. An army under the command of Imagawa Sessai laid siege to the castle where Oda Nobuhiro, Nobuhides eldest son, with the castle about to fall, Sessai offered a deal to Oda Nobunaga, Nobuhides second son. Sessai offered to give up the siege if Ieyasu was handed over to the Imagawa, Nobunaga agreed, and so Ieyasu was taken as a hostage to Sunpu. Here he lived a good life as hostage and potentially useful future ally of the Imagawa clan until 1556 when he was age 13 years old. In 1556 he came of age, and, following tradition, one year later, at the age of 13, he married his first wife, Lady Tsukiyama, and changed his name again to Matsudaira Kurandonosuke Motoyasu
11.
Oda Nobunaga
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Oda Nobunaga was a powerful Daimyō of Japan in the late 16th century who attempted to unify Japan during the late Sengoku period. Nobunaga is regarded as one of three unifiers of Japan along with his retainers Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu, Nobunaga was widely known as one of the most brutal figures in history, eliminating anyone who stood in his way. He was both a ruler and keen businessman, strategizing at both the micro- and macroeconomic scales. He met his demise when his retainer Akechi Mitsuhide rebelled against him at Honnō-ji, Oda Nobunaga was the first for whom this goal seemed attainable. Nobunaga had gained control over most of Honshu before his death during the 1582 Honnō-ji incident and it is not certain whether Nobunaga was killed in the attack or else committed seppuku. The motivations behind Mitsuhides betrayal was never revealed to anyone who survived the incident, following the incident, Akechi Mitsuhide declared himself master over Nobunagas domains, but was quickly defeated by Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who regained control of and greatly expanded the Oda holdings. Oda Nobunaga was born on June 23,1534, in the Owari domain and he was the second son of Oda Nobuhide, a deputy shugo with land holdings in Owari Province. He is said to have born in Nagoya Castle, although this is subject to debate. Through his childhood and early years, he was well known for his bizarre behavior. He was known to run around with other youths from the area, with the introduction of firearms into Japan, however, he became known for his fondness of tanegashima firearms. In 1551, Oda Nobuhide died unexpectedly, Nobunaga was said to have acted outrageously during his funeral, throwing ceremonial incense at the altar. This convinced many Oda retainers of Nobunagas mediocrity and lack of discipline, alienated, they then began to side with his soft-spoken and well-mannered brother, Nobuyuki. Hirate Masahide, a mentor and retainer to Nobunaga, was ashamed by Nobunagas behavior. This had an effect on Nobunaga, who later built a temple to honor Masahide. Although Nobunaga was Nobuhides legitimate successor, the Oda clan was divided into factions. Oda Nobutomo, the deceased Nobuhides brother and deputy to the shugo, used the weak Yoshimune as his puppet, Nobutomo murdered Yoshimune when it was discovered that he supported and attempted to aid Nobunaga. This also ensured that the Imagawa clan would have to stop attacking Owaris borders, although Nobuyuki and his supporters were still at large, Nobunaga brought an army to Mino Province to aid Saitō Dōsan after Dōsans son, Saitō Yoshitatsu, turned against him. The campaign failed, as Dōsan was killed in the Battle of Nagara-gawa, a few months later Nobuyuki, with support from Shibata Katsuie and Hayashi Hidesada, rebelled against Nobunaga
12.
Sake
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Sake, also spelled saké in English, is a Japanese rice wine made by fermenting rice that has been polished to remove the bran. The brewing process for sake differs from the process for beer in that, for beer, like other rice wines, when sake is brewed, these conversions occur simultaneously. Furthermore, the alcohol content differs between sake, wine, and beer, Wine generally contains 9%–16% ABV, while most beer contains 3%–9%, and undiluted sake contains 18%–20%. In the Japanese language, the word sake can refer to any alcoholic drink, under Japanese liquor laws, sake is labelled with the word seishu, a synonym less commonly used in conversation. The origin of sake is unclear, the making of Chinese alcoholic beverages predates recorded history. The earliest reference to the use of alcohol in Japan is recorded in the Book of Wei in the Records of the Three Kingdoms and this 3rd-century Chinese text speaks of the Japanese drinking and dancing. Alcoholic beverages are mentioned several times in the Kojiki, Japans first written history, bamforth places the probable origin of true sake (which is made from rice, water, and kōji mold in the Nara period. In the Heian period, sake was used for ceremonies, court festivals. Sake production was a government monopoly for a time, but in the 10th century, temples and shrines began to brew sake. The Tamon-in Diary, written by abbots of Tamon-in from 1478 to 1618, the diary shows that pasteurization and the process of adding ingredients to the main fermentation mash in three stages were established practices by that time. In the 16th century, the technique of distillation was introduced into the Kyushu district from Ryukyu, the brewing of shōchū, called Imo—sake started, and was sold at the central market in Kyoto. The work of writers was widely disseminated throughout Europe at the beginning of the 19th century. During the Meiji Restoration, laws were written that allowed anybody with the money and know-how to construct, around 30,000 breweries sprang up around the country within a year. However, as the years went by, the government levied more and more taxes on the sake industry, most of the breweries that grew and survived this period were set up by wealthy landowners. Landowners who grew rice crops would have left over at the end of the season and, rather than letting these leftovers go to waste. The most successful of these family breweries still operate today, during the 20th century, sake-brewing technology grew by leaps and bounds. The government opened the sake-brewing research institute in 1904, and in 1907 the very first government-run sake-tasting competition was held, yeast strains specifically selected for their brewing properties were isolated and enamel-coated steel tanks arrived. The government started hailing the use of tanks as easy to clean, lasting forever
