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gradually extended, and a military class sprang up which rapidly grew to occupy a powerful position. People of the Court and in the Government were losing their vigour, living amid the luxury, corruption, and intrigue which was increasing at the capital Kyoto during the centuries of peace, while the two principal military clans of Japan, the Taira and the Minamotos, descended from the Princes of the Imperial Family, were spreading the sphere of their influence over Japan, the former chiefly in the South, and the latter in the North and East. Certain disagreements arising at Court between the Emperor and his Minister of State on one hand, and the ex-Emperor and his Minister of State on the other, these two clans were called upon to help settle the dispute. The Taira clan assisted the new Emperor, Go-Shirakawa (1156–1158), and his Minister Fujiwara-no-Tedamichi, while most of the Minamoto clan joined with the ex-Emperor Sutoku (1124–1141) and his Minister Fujiwara-no-Yorinaga, and they carried on the war known as the war of Hogen (1156, 1st year of Hogen). The Minamotos being defeated on the field, the Taira clans occupied, naturally, more dominant positions at Court, and later in the war of Heji (1159, or 1st year of Heji) gained entire control over them. The influence of the Fujiwara family at Court then gave way to that of the Taira clan, and the Ministers of State were appointed from among their chief generals. During the reign of the Emperor Rokujo (1166–1168), in the year 1167 (2nd year of Ninnan), Taira-no-Kiyomori was appointed Minister President (Dajo-Daijin), and occupied the same position at Court and in the Government as the Fujiwara had formerly. This is considered the second step in the establishment of the Shogunate.
The civil and military supremacy of the Taira clan did not continue long, owing to their mismanagement of political affairs. During the reign of the eighty-first Emperor, Antoku (1180–1183), Minamoto-no-Yoritomo rose in the province of Izu, and waged war against the Taira (1180, 4th year of Jisho), to restore the military prestige lost by his clan; and at the famous naval battle of Dan-no-ura the Taira were utterly defeated (1185, or 1st year of Bunji). Then Yoritomo appealed to the Emperor (eighty-second Emperor, Go-Toba, 1183–1198) to give him sanction for establishing the military administration of Japan, as a military administration was the only system that could be adopted at that time for the restoration of peace and order in the country after it had suffered so many successive tumults by war.
The Emperor granted his request, and Yoritomo established his residence and seat of operations at Kamakura (province of Sagami), a situation which enabled him to hold the military