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After the Jinshin War: What Emperor Tenmu Rebuilt

Published October 25, 2026

Returning to Asuka after winning the Jinshin War, Emperor Tenmu appointed no ministers and ran the country together with the royal family. He made the clans' people the state's, had the emperor fix the standing of families and individuals, and ordered law and national history to be written. We follow the fourteen years in which the framework of the ritsuryō state came into view.

Victory, and a return to Asuka

In 672, having won the Jinshin War, Prince Ōama did not move into the Ōtsu Palace in Ōmi but returned to Asuka. In the second month of 673 he took the throne at the Asuka Kiyomihara Palace as Emperor Tenmu.

The victory also stripped away much of the old clans' power. Soga no Akae, Minister of the Left who had supported the Ōmi court, was exiled, and Nakatomi no Kane, Minister of the Right, was executed. The powerful men who had run the court under Emperor Tenji were on the losing side.

In the fourteen or so years until Emperor Tenmu's death, the structure of the state was rebuilt on a large scale. Laid out as a timeline, it looks like this.

The course of Emperor Tenmu's reforms. Filled markers show the major turning points.

No ministers

Throughout his reign, Emperor Tenmu never appointed a minister (daijin). This stands in contrast to the days when the Soga stood at the top of the court as Ōomi, and to Emperor Tenji's reign, which had Ministers of the Left and Right.

At the center of government were the emperor himself, his empress Princess Uno no Sarara (later Empress Jitō), and princes such as Kusakabe, Ōtsu and Takechi. Later historians call this "government by the imperial kin." Rather than leaving things to powerful clans, the emperor and his family ran the country directly.

Turning the clans' people into the state's

In 675 Emperor Tenmu abolished the kakibe that had been granted to the clans in Emperor Tenji's reign, in 664. Kakibe were people each clan held privately. At the same time, the mountains, forests and ponds that had been given to royals, clans and temples were taken back.

The principle that land and people belong to the state had been proclaimed in the Reform Edict after the Isshi Incident. Emperor Tenmu was the one who actually pushed it through.

Officials chosen by their work

In 673 Emperor Tenmu decreed that anyone entering court service for the first time should start as a palace attendant (ōtoneri) close to the emperor, and then be assigned to a post according to his abilities. In 678 rules were also made for rating officials' work every year and promoting them on that basis.

Posts were no longer settled by birth alone; men were observed close to the emperor and rose by their work. The shape of the official as a profession was being set here.

The standing of families and the rank of individuals

In 684 Emperor Tenmu established the eight kabane, re-ranking the clans' family titles into eight grades according to closeness to the emperor. Mahito, ason and sukune were the top three, and omi and muraji, which had once shared the summit of the court, fell to sixth and seventh. We cover this in detail in a separate column.

In 685 the court ranks given to individuals were also revised: twelve grades for royals, named myō and jō, and forty-eight for officials, named shō, jiki, gon, mu, tsui and shin. Each was divided into greater and broad, and further subdivided by number.

The key point is that royals now came inside the ranking system. Under the twelve-rank system of 603, royals and the Soga, who held the post of Ōomi, had stood outside it. Now only the emperor stood on the side of granting ranks, and everyone else, royals included, was lined up in order beneath him.

Kabane for the standing of families, court ranks for individuals: a system in which the emperor determined both was now complete.

Law, and the nation's history

In the second month of 681, Emperor Tenmu gathered the princes and ministers and ordered them to draw up a legal code. The work continued after his death and was put into force in 689, under Empress Jitō, as the Asuka Kiyomihara Code, the foundation for the later Taihō Code.

The next month he ordered twelve people, led by Prince Kawashima, to record and settle the imperial genealogy and the events of ancient times. The state would write its own history. This work led in time to the Kojiki of 712 and the Nihon Shoki of 720.

Manners, appearance, and the military

In 682 the kneeling and crawling forms of courtesy at court were abolished in favor of standing bows. The same year, men and women alike were ordered to tie up their hair. Manners and appearance were modeled on the Tang court.

In 684 he issued an edict declaring that "the essence of government is military affairs," ordering officials to keep weapons and practice riding. They are fitting words for an emperor who won his throne in war.

Coins, and the word tennō

In the fourth month of 683, Emperor Tenmu issued an edict: "From now on, use copper coins without fail; do not use silver coins." The coin thought to correspond to these copper coins is the Fuhonsen.

The Nara Prefecture Complex of Man'yo Culture — The Asukaike workshop site, where Fuhonsen were cast, lies on the grounds of the Man'yo Culture complex

In the late 1990s, excavations at the Asukaike workshop site turned up large numbers of Fuhonsen together with molds and casting waste. It was confirmed that coins older than the Wadō Kaichin of 708 had actually been made in Asuka. How far they circulated as money, or whether they were made as charms, is still debated.

The same site also yielded a wooden tablet from Emperor Tenmu's reign bearing the word tennō, "emperor." The prevailing view is that the title tennō began to be used in place of ōkimi, "great king," around the time of Emperor Tenmu.

A sign tower reading "Nara Prefecture Complex of Man'yō Culture, Entrance," with a bamboo grove and a reception hut behind

SPOTNara Prefecture Complex of Man'yō Culture奈良県立万葉文化館A centre for ancient culture built around the Man'yōshū.Access: Right by the "Manyō Bunkakan Nishiguchi" stop on the Asuka loop bus from Kintetsu Kashiharajingu-mae StationSee the spot page →

Temples, and a new capital

Emperor Tenmu also established temples run by the state. In 673 he built the Takechi Ōdera, later renamed Daikandai-ji. In 680 he vowed to build Yakushi-ji, praying for his empress's recovery from illness. The Daikandai-ji and Moto-Yakushiji sites that remain today in Asuka and Kashihara belong to that line of temples.

And in his last years Emperor Tenmu chose the site for a new capital: the Fujiwara capital, with its grid of streets. But he died in 686 without seeing it completed.

It was his empress who carried it on

The one who carried on Emperor Tenmu's work was his empress, Empress Jitō. She put the Asuka Kiyomihara Code into force in 689, had a nationwide census register (the Kōin register) compiled in 690, and moved to the Fujiwara capital in 694. Then, in 701, the Taihō Code was completed.

No ministers; the clans' people made the state's; the standing of families and individuals fixed by the emperor; law and history written by the state. It is fair to say that the framework of the ritsuryō state had largely taken shape during Tenmu's fourteen years at the Asuka Kiyomihara Palace.

Seeing it in Asuka

The Asuka Kiyomihara Palace, where Emperor Tenmu governed, is thought to correspond to the uppermost layer of the Asuka Palace Site. The stone paving and well visible there today belong to the palace of this era.