jizamurai

The jizamurai (地侍; Japanese pronunciation: [dʑi.(d)zaꜜ.mɯ.ɾai], lit. 'samurai of the land') were lower-ranking provincial samurai that emerged in 15th-century Japan Muromachi period. The definition was rather broad and the term jizamurai included landholding military aristocracy as well as independent peasant farmers. They alternated between warfare and using their relatively small plots of land for intensive and diversified forms of agriculture. They came from the powerful myōshu (名主), who owned farmland and held leadership positions in their villages, and became vassals of shugo (守護) and later sengoku daimyō (戦国大名). One of the primary causes for the rise in the number of smaller landholders was a decline in the custom of primogeniture. Towards the end of the Kamakura period, inheritance ...