Masakado did actually end up rebelling against the court, but the process was almost accidental, and his rebellion seems to have been a gamble at creating a negotiating position for himself, rather than a sincere attempt to break away from court authority. His historical reputation as a rebel probably stems from both the fact that he lost, and the fact that he came so close.
His troubles began as a series of spats with relatives and local rivals, during which he took great pains to stay within the good graces of the law. His undoing came when he got mixed up-through a very complex set of circumstances-in a local quarrel involving one of his allies in Hitachi province that resulted in-again through a complicated sequence of events-his troops occupying and looting the provincial capital. That put Masakado unequivocally on the wrong side of the law.
In traditional accounts, Masakado at this point just went crazy, taking over the provincial headquarters in seven other eastern provinces and declaring himself to be a New Emperor in the east. But the declaration of a new kingdom (and his title of New Emperor) appear only in a literary account of his adventures, and can’t be corroborated by more reliable sources. And there’s another way to read his advance from Hitachi to the rest of the East: He was trying to strengthen his hand in order to negotiate a pardon for the fiasco in Hitachi.
As Bob Dylan pointed out, “Steal a little and they throw you in jail; steal a lot and they make you king.” Having already crossed the line into rebellion against the state by his actions in Hitachi, Masakado was in trouble. But he kept negotiating for a pardon, even as he was gathering up the keys to the provincial capitals over the rest of the east, which strongly suggests that what he really wanted was simply to make himself formidable enough that the court would have to deal with him, rather than simply take him out. Other warrior leaders-including Minamoto Yoritomo, the founder of the first shogunate-followed pretty much the same strategy successfully. The difference between Masakado’s case and Yoritomo’s was mostly one of luck and circumstances, so Masakado lost while Yoritomo pulled it off.‥‥
About his book The First Samurai
http://www.theshogunshouse.com/2009/08/interview-with-historianprofessor-karl.html
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