Category Archives: religion

by | 7 July 2025 · 6:10 am

Mazovia (with Warsaw) Joins Poland

From Poland: The First Thousand Years, by Patrice M. Dabrowski (Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle pp. 146-149:

Zygmunt’s reign did bring many positive developments, however. One important accomplishment was the ultimate incorporation of Mazovia (with its ducal capital of Warsaw) into the Crown of Poland. Regardless how odd this may seem to contemporary readers, Warsaw—despite its central location and later claims to fame—was not yet fully a part of the realm. Since the fourteenth century, Mazovia had been a fief of Poland, controlled by a branch of the old Piast princely dynasty. Bit by bit, the Crown of Poland had acquired pieces of that territory; yet it was only after the death of the last Mazovian prince, Janusz III, in 1526 that the process of incorporation was completed.

For a Polish province, Mazovia was in many ways atypical. The duchy had long eschewed battle with the Teutonic Knights to its immediate north and even maintained good trade relations with them. As of the late fourteenth century, Mazovians had played an important role in facilitating the trade of timber and naval stores coming to Baltic ports via the Narew, Bug, and Vistula Rivers. The duchy likewise assisted the transit trade of furs, wax, and honey from Lithuania as well as cattle from Volhynia. After 1500, Mazovians expanded their activities to include the grain trade. As for the social composition of the duchy, it boasted a preponderance of nobles—certainly vis-à-vis Poland-Lithuania as a whole. Some 20 percent of the population claimed a noble patent—quite a large number, though to be sure most of these were impoverished soldier-nobles. Warsaw had a provincial feel, although in the sixteenth century it was beginning its ascent, in part thanks to trade.

[It sounds as if Poland may have acquired its own equivalents of the Prussian Junker class when it incorporated Masovia into the Crown of Poland.–J.]

Although King Zygmunt managed to incorporate the remaining pieces of Mazovia into the Crown, he was less successful in pressing state and dynastic interests in the region of the Baltic Sea, this despite a very real occasion to do so. For a war fought against the Teutonic Order in 1519–1521 brought the Knights to their knees—literally. One of the most famous images in Polish history dates from 1525, the so-called Prussian Homage. A triumphant view of this grand event was painted in 1882 by the nineteenth-century Polish artist Jan Matejko, whose colorful brushstrokes lavishly rendered the scene of the former grand master of the Teutonic Knights, Albrecht von Hohenzollern, kneeling before the Polish king and publicly swearing his fealty.

Yet such a rosy view of the event—although attractive to Matejko’s contemporaries, who took especial pleasure in seeing Prussians bowing down before the Poles, even if only in the deep historical past—was misleading. Much more could have been achieved than simply having Albrecht von Hohenzollern kneel before the Polish king (who was, after all, his uncle) and resign himself to the status of subordinate. What could have marked the end of Prussia as an independent entity—had Zygmunt pursued the fight further—instead gave little Prussia a new lease on life. Recall that part of Prussia had already been incorporated into the Crown by Zygmunt’s father. This was the so-called Royal Prussia, which had sought to break away from the hold of the Teutonic Knights and turned to the Polish king for help.

What went wrong, then? Although it was a Polish fief, in this moment Prussia was permitted to undergo a notable change. No longer to be run by the Teutonic Knights, it was transformed by Albrecht von Hohenzollern-Ansbach (the aforementioned nephew of Zygmunt) into a secular state. Henceforth the last grand master of the Teutonic Order would be known as Duke of Prussia, and his successors would have hereditary rights in the lands formerly held by the Order. Not only that: the Prussia of Albrecht von Hohenzollern simultaneously embraced the views promulgated by Martin Luther, who by nailing his ninety-five theses to the door of a church in Wittenberg in 1517 initiated a movement that would forever change the face of Christian Europe. This was the Protestant Reformation. Close to Martin Luther himself, Albrecht became—with Zygmunt’s permission—the first territorial Lutheran ruler and Prussia became the first Protestant state in Europe.

That this should occur without bloodshed or upheaval was in part due to Zygmunt the Old’s willingness to approve this amazing transformation of the former arch-Catholic polity—in part to keep Ducal Prussia from moving into the orbit of the Holy Roman Empire. To be sure, in the Treaty of Kraków of 1525—the first European treaty between a Catholic and a Protestant state—Zygmunt and Albrecht agreed that Ducal Prussia would come fully under Polish control on the extinction of Albrecht of Hohenzollern’s line. That only a generation later a different king would, in a pinch, exchange his hereditary rights to succession for military assistance is but one of the fateful missteps that would haunt Polish history for centuries to come, even if it could not be foreseen in 1525.

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by | 4 July 2025 · 5:42 am

The Jagiellonian Moment, c. 1500

From Poland: The First Thousand Years, by Patrice M. Dabrowski (Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle pp. 116-120:

Kazimierz IV Jagiellon married Elizabeth, the daughter of Albrecht Habsburg and granddaughter of Sigismund of Luxemburg. She produced for him an abundance of heirs: six sons and five daughters. This situation was enviable in a world where dynasties so often died out but also challenging, in that all this royal blood cried out for distinguished posts. And indeed: the royal pair strove to find places for their children to rule, capitalizing on the still prevalent medieval idea that royal bloodlines were important. All their children were brought up for exalted positions, and many of them would rule on one throne or another (sometimes on several at once). They were given an excellent education under none other than Jan Długosz, former secretary to Bishop Zbigniew Oleśnicki and Kraków canon. His greatest and certainly most durable claim to fame came from his twelve-book Latin-language history of Poland, Annales seu Cronicae Regni Poloniae (Annals or Chronicles of the Kingdom of Poland), which covered the history of the country up to 1480. In addition to royal heads of state, the pupils of the royal tutor Długosz included a future cardinal (Kazimierz’s son Fryderyk) as well as a future saint (his namesake, Kazimierz).

…

A longer period ensued before the same Jagiellon gained control over the Hungarian throne. In Hungary, it was the Transylvanian-born Matthias Corvinus (son of János Hunyadi) who was chosen king in 1458, doubtless in part due to the memory of his father’s military prowess, which he seemed to have inherited. Better known by a nickname taken from the raven (Latin: corvus) on his escutcheon, Corvinus was the first commoner to ascend to the Hungarian throne, and he was an outstanding ruler. He made inroads into what had been Poděbrady’s holdings, annexing Moravia and Silesia as well as the Lusatias. At one point the Hungarian king even occupied Vienna, the Habsburgs’ capital, which he retained control of until his death in the spring of 1490. Władysław followed these developments closely. To strengthen his position as a candidate for the throne, that autumn the Jagiellon secretly married Corvinus’s widow, and she sought to have him gain power in Hungary. Although it may seem paradoxical, there was opposition from Władysław’s own father, who wanted to seat another son, Jan Olbracht, on the Hungarian throne. The men even fought two wars over the succession (so much for family unity). Yet, once the Habsburgs got involved, the tide turned against Jan Olbracht. To keep Hungary and Bohemia safely in Jagiellonian hands, Kazimierz IV Jagiellończyk threw his weight behind his eldest son, already seated on the Bohemian throne.

…

Although in Hungary he was officially hailed as King Ulászló II, Władysław came to be known there as King Bene—this, apparently, from always answering “very well” (bene) to whatever was asked of him. Among other things, in 1514 he allowed the Hungarian nobles to establish the so-called Tripartitum, a new codification of Hungarian law that gave them increased power over their peasants. Yet the Jagiellon was indeed the true ruler of the two countries, though he reconfigured them somewhat, restoring Moravia, Silesia, and Lusatia to the kingdom of Bohemia (they had come under Hungarian control under Matthias Corvinus). He also notably restored Vienna and eastern Austria, which had been occupied by Corvinus, to the Habsburgs—a move that, while keeping Habsburgs from conniving to unseat him, would nonetheless strengthen a future rival to Jagiellonian rule. Władysław lived until 1516, to be succeeded on both thrones by his son Louis (Czech: Ludvik; Hungarian: Lajos). In this way, Jagiellons came to control both the Bohemian Crown of Saint Wenceslas and the Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen.

But this was only the near realm of Central Europe. All five daughters of Kazimierz Jagiellończyk fared well in the marriage game also. They demonstrated the potential impact of the Jagiellonian dynasty on the German-speaking world. Jadwiga married George the Rich, prince of Bavaria. Another daughter, Barbara, wed another George the Bearded, duke of Saxony. Two other sisters, Anna and Elżbieta, married the dukes of Pomerania and Legnica (German: Liegnitz), respectively; each of these husbands (Bogislaw X and Friedrich II) would be given the sobriquet of Great. Their other sister, Zofia, was the wife of Friedrich von Hohenzollern-Ansbach, elector of Brandenburg. Zofia would give birth to Albrecht von Hohenzollern-Ansbach, who (as we shall see) would be last in the long line of grand masters of the Teutonic Order on the Baltic Sea coast.

All this left the Jagiellons seemingly in a strong position. Men from the dynasty came to control all of East-Central Europe: from Hungary and Bohemia through Poland and Lithuania, putting them in a position to rule over vast territories and peoples. Kazimierz IV Jagiellon ruled Poland and Lithuania, while his son Władysław had ascended to the Crowns of Saint Wenceslas and Saint Stephen—that is, Bohemia and Hungary, respectively. Jagiellons would rule uninterruptedly over these four political entities for some thirty-six years: from 1490 to 1526, their power extended from the Baltic to the Adriatic and nearly all the way to the Black Sea.

That the Jagiellonian Moment in Central and Eastern Europe is so little known has to do with both the nature of Jagiellonian rule and the times in which they lived. With the exception of Lithuania, the countries they ruled—Poland, Bohemia, Hungary—were elective monarchies with relatively powerful, noble-dominated parliaments. In these countries, what was wanted was not an absolute monarch but, rather, someone who would work with the existing parliamentary bodies.

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by | 3 July 2025 · 5:56 am

Poland and Lithuania Unite

From Poland: The First Thousand Years, by Patrice M. Dabrowski (Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle pp. 105-107:

In 1411 a peace between the Polish-Lithuanian state and the Teutonic Order was finally achieved at Toruń. At that time, Jagiełło managed only to secure Žemaitija for Lithuania and Dobrzyń for Poland. Thus, ultimately, Lithuania benefited much more than did the Crown of Poland—somewhat paradoxical in a state that purportedly was dominated by the Polish half. While Lithuania regained all that it sought, the Poles remained unsatisfied. Notably, however, these were the territories that the Order had refused to give Poland-Lithuania to keep the peace only a year earlier. Still, this left many formerly Polish lands along the Baltic coast in the hands of the Teutonic Order, including the important towns of Gdańsk and Toruń. And the Crown of Poland still had no outlet to the sea.

However, in a way, the Battle of Grunwald [= the First Battle of Tannenberg in what is now named Stębark] did have an important outcome for Poland-Lithuania. The joint fight against a common enemy brought the subjects of the two halves of the state closer together, proving to Poles and Lithuanians alike that they had mutual interests. Together, they could accomplish much, even if separately each (especially Lithuania) was weak.

Within a couple of years, Poles and Lithuanians took another step on the road to becoming closer. This was in the so-called Union of Horodło, signed in the Volhynian town of that name in 1413. What had previously been a personal union cemented solely by the person of Jagiełło would now have a solid dynastic connection. To be sure, the position of grand duke in Lithuania would be hereditary (Vytautas agreed to be dux [no modifier], under Jagiełło), while the king of Poland would be elected. But the latter—that is, Jagiełło’s successor—would come from the Lithuanian dynasty, to be elected upon consultation of Vytautas and the Lithuanian boyars.

One of the most interesting provisions of the tripartite document called for a special union of (Catholic) Lithuanian and Polish nobility and clergy. Some fifty years after their conversion to Roman Catholicism, forty-seven Lithuanian noble families were embraced by and included in Polish heraldic clans. In this way, the palatine of Kraków, for example, accepted into his Leliwa clan the palatine of Vilnius. The Polish castellan of Sącz would be united with the Lithuanian castellan of Trakai (Polish: Troki). The numerous Półkozic clan embraced a Lithuanian noble family, while the protoplast [progenitor] of the Lithuanian Radvila family (better known under their Polonized name, Radziwiłł) became part of the Sulima clan. In essence, a joint Polish-Lithuanian noble estate was established. Henceforth, there would be a single nation for the united state.

The Preamble to the Union of Horodło gives evidence of the lofty principles undergirding the union: “Whosoever is unsupported by the mystery of Love, shall not achieve the Grace of salvation. . . . For by Love, laws are made, kingdoms governed, cities ordered, and the state of the commonweal is brought to its proper goal.” The love between the Poles and Lithuanians would truly have a familial (clan) basis now. Yet the union was not complete. It did not include the Orthodox nobility—for the most part, Ruthenes. They were, in a way, second-class citizens—something that would not bode well for the future.

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by | 2 July 2025 · 6:11 am

Dilemmas of Pagan Lithuania

From Poland: The First Thousand Years, by Patrice M. Dabrowski (Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle pp. 88-90:

The pagan Lithuanians had managed to conquer the western Ruthenian territories (roughly today’s Belarus and Ukraine) at the time of these lands’ greatest weakness. In a relatively short space of time, they made huge advances. Lithuania gained control over Polatsk in 1307, over Minsk in 1340, over Smolensk (a mere 230 miles from Moscow) in 1356, and even over the far-distant Kyiv—the former, great capital of Kyivan Rus’—in 1363.

This tremendous expansion was in part facilitated by the protoplast [= progenitor] of the great Lithuanian dynasty, Gediminas (1315–1341). He was ably assisted by his numerous sons, the most important Kestutis and Algirdas. While Kestutis’s presence could be felt in the Polish southeast in 1376, it was Algirdas who earlier defeated the Golden Horde at Syni Vody (Blue Waters; Polish: Sine Wody) and gained control over Kyiv. The two formed a sort of diarchy—a kind of dual rule that would be inherited by their sons, Jogaila (Algirdas’s favorite son) and Vytautas.

In the process of conquering this large swath of Eastern Europe, the Lithuanian Gediminid dynasty inherited a sizable population that was Slavic and Orthodox—a population that outnumbered the Lithuanians themselves eight to one. The Lithuanians figured mainly as rulers and elites. Most of the East Slavic inhabitants—most notably, the boyars (nobles) of Ruthenia to the south—were members of the Orthodox faith. In other words, they were Christians, but not followers of the Church of Rome.

The pagan Lithuanians within this large multiethnic entity were the nobles and villagers of the north—that is, residing in the core Lithuanian territories, before the decline of Rus’ allowed the Lithuanians to gain control of a good chunk of the Ruthenian lands. This was a small but not insignificant population, especially as it included members of the ruling family, such as the future king of Poland. This expanded Lithuanian state was a completely decentralized entity, with descendants of Gediminas ruling over various sections of the state (and often quarreling among themselves).

Although Lithuanians ruled, the rapid expansion of the state left the initial population, which had yet to establish a written language, with real challenges. How could they rule over Christian, and lettered, peoples? In part this imbalance was ameliorated by the Lithuanians availing themselves of a ready-made state language—the language of the conquered Ruthenes. Intermarriage with Ruthenian princes led to the spread of Ruthenian culture within the Grand Duchy. Many Gediminids became converts to Orthodoxy and otherwise found the culture of the conquered Slavs to be attractive. Some went so far as to ally themselves with the Muscovite state to the east. This most certainly was true of the numerous sons of Algirdas and his first wife, Maria, all of whom embraced Orthodoxy and ruled in the eastern section of the Grand Duchy. (Their half-brother Jogaila long remained a pagan, as did the other children of Algirdas and his second wife, Juliana of Tver—this notwithstanding her Orthodox provenance.)

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by | 1 July 2025 · 5:44 am

Polak, Węgier dwa bratanki

From Poland: The First Thousand Years, by Patrice M. Dabrowski (Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle pp. 74-75:

But the Hungarian and Polish king found himself in the same situation as had Kazimierz. He too had no male heir—only daughters, and these were born to him late in life. They included the previously mentioned Maria and her younger sister, Hedwig. (An older sister, Catherine, also figured in the picture until her death in 1378.) As already noted, Maria was betrothed to Sigismund of Luxemburg, whose father was king of Bohemia as well as Holy Roman Emperor. Hedwig—born only in the year 1374—also awaited a princely husband, having been promised in marriage since early childhood to Wilhelm of Habsburg.

…

All of this might have been enough to inspire a degree of friendliness between Hungarians and Poles. Historically they were on good terms. They did not figure as much of a threat to each other, as they were both just one step removed from Bohemia and the Holy Roman Empire. The Carpathian Mountains served as a boundary between the two countries, but it was a porous one. There was much contact across that border. Furthermore, it is important to note, the clanlike structure and the substantial role played by the nobilities in the two countries were similar. It is not for nothing that, even today, Poles know the ditty “Polak, Węgier dwa bratanki—tak do szabli, jak do szklanki” [emphasis added] (The Pole and the Magyar like brothers stand / Whether with sword or with tankard in hand), whereas the corresponding Hungarian rhyme affects the same brotherly affection for the hard-fighting—and drinking—Poles. (The verse, however, dates from a much later period.)

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by | 30 June 2025 · 1:13 pm

King Kazimierz III the Great

From Poland: The First Thousand Years, by Patrice M. Dabrowski (Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle pp. 62-63:

King Kazimierz III the Great encouraged Jewish settlement in the Polish lands. The recent incidence of the so-called Black Death in Europe’s west had led Jews there to be turned into scapegoats, leading many to flee eastward. Kazimierz’s reception of the Jewish communities led some even to label him “king of the Jews”—and led Jews to revere his name. In charters granted in 1334, 1364, and 1367, Kazimierz made it clear that Jews were subjects of the Crown, and as such they were protected by it.

Kazimierz was a nearly model medieval monarch. He did more than consolidate and make secure the country’s expanding borders and provide for further economic development. He truly established the Corona Regni Poloniae—the Crown of the Polish Kingdom. No longer were the Polish lands simply the property of the Piast dynasty. As the Crown of the Polish Kingdom, they existed independently, outside the person of the monarch. In this way, one can see parallels between the formation of other states in the region. The united Bohemian lands were also referred to as the Crown of Saint Wenceslas, which Charles IV declared distinct from the fate of the Luxemburg dynasty; a similar understanding took hold in Hungary, which was also known as the Lands of the Crown of Saint Stephen.

Kazimierz drew up a number of statutes that would help shape the administration of the state, especially insofar as laws and the functioning of a judiciary were concerned. He also upheld the country’s defense. Even today, any Polish child can recite the ditty (unpoetically rendered here) that Kazimierz “inherited wooden towns and left them fortified with stone and brick” (Kazimierz miasta zastał drewniane i zostawił murowane). The country underwent a great program of construction. It was funded in part by a land tax paid by peasants (who nonetheless had a favorable view of the monarch, who was also known as “king of the peasants”), in part by income that came from the rich salt mines of Wieliczka and Bochnia in the south of the country. (Even today, the salt mine at Wieliczka—quite a tourist destination—is a testament to the technological feat undertaken in this early period.) Growing exports and tax revenues funded the construction of some fifty castles, and fortification walls were supplied to nearly another thirty towns.

Another major and far-sighted achievement of King Kazimierz the Great was his establishment, in 1364, of a studium generale (variously titled an academy or a university) in his capital of Kraków. Pope Urban V gave his permission for instruction to be provided in canon and civil law and all other faculties except for theology. Nonetheless, Kazimierz’s academy was a secular institution, like the universities of Padua and Bologna. Its establishment boded well for education in the Polish lands. Furthermore, it was a rare distinction in this part of the world: in Central Europe, only Prague can boast of having obtained a university earlier.

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by | 28 June 2025 · 9:59 am

Poland Becomes Catholic, 966

From Poland: The First Thousand Years, by Patrice M. Dabrowski (Cornell University Press, 2014), Kindle pp. 28-31:

Mieszko seems to have led the Polanie as of about the year 960. The reason we know of him and his state is that, like the Moravians to the south, the Germans (that is, the Christian population to the west, which was part of post-Carolingian Europe, the eastern part of which was ruled by the German emperor) were beginning to pay attention to this emerging state centered around Gniezno [cf. gniazdo ‘nest’]. Early recorded mention of Mieszko’s doings has come down to us from a Jewish trader, Ibrahim Ibn Jakub, who, while on business in Magdeburg in 966, learned of the existence of a well-organized state that was conquering some of the Slavic tribes to its west. A Saxon monk noted the existence of the dynamically expanding state, which likewise caught the attention of Otto I. Titled Emperor of the Romans by the pope only in 962, the German Otto had pretentions to the same region. Before long, Mieszko’s realm came to be referred to as Poland, or the land of the Poles.

It is customary to date the beginnings of the history of Poland to 966. This choice of date reflects a momentous decision made that year. Until this point, the Polanie and the neighboring tribes in the vicinity of Central and Eastern Europe were for the most part pagans. This was not true of the Germans further west, who had already converted to Christianity in late antiquity or the early medieval period; nor was it true for the Moravians, who had witnessed the ninth-century ministry of Cyril and Methodius, the missionaries to the Slavs, although by this time—a century later—they were under German influence. (Note that Kyivan Rus’, lying further to the east, was baptized only as of 988, but its baptism came from Greek sources, that is, Constantinople.) In this part of the world, of world-historical significance was what religion these pagan rulers chose, and at whose hands they were baptized.

It is in 966 that the baptism of Mieszko—head of the Gniezno state, this nascent Polish polity—took place. It is both interesting and important that this was facilitated not by the Germans but by a Bohemian (Czech) connection. A Czech state had emerged around the turn of the eighth and ninth centuries; first baptized by Saint Methodius, the Czechs relatively quickly came under Bavarian influence, their church under the bishop of Regensburg. In 965 Mieszko strengthened the connection with this Slavic neighbor by marrying a Bohemian princess, the daughter of Boleslav I. This Dubravka, known variously also as Dąbrówka or Dobrava, was a Christian, and she likely brought some Christian clergy with her to Gniezno. The next year, Mieszko accepted baptism at their hands.

What is important for the future history of Poland is that this was Western, and not Eastern, Christianity—that is, Mieszko was baptized into the Church of Rome, as it was then known. No less important is that baptism came from Bohemia, not from the imperial power to the west. Mieszko furthermore took care to ensure that his state was placed under the care of missionaries. As missionary priests were directly subordinated to the papacy and not to a bishop within any given territory, this gave the nascent Polish church more flexibility because it was not placed under another sovereign state.

Thus began the Poles’ connection with Roman Catholicism, one that dates back a millennium. It is a connection that has stuck. Until very recently, many people around the world associated Poland above all with the man who, until not so long ago, was head of the Universal Church—Karol Wojtyła, better known as Pope John Paul II. During his first trip to Poland after he became pontiff, John Paul II famously declared to his countrymen that “it was impossible, without reference to Christ, to understand the history of the Polish nation, this great thousand-year-old community that so profoundly shapes my existence and that of each of us.” While clearly there is much to this statement, one cannot say that the Christianization of Poland or the Poles’ historic identification with Roman Catholicism were inevitable. Nor (as we shall see) is the belief that all “real” Poles have always been, or must be, Roman Catholics borne out by the country’s history, certainly not if one examines that history in its entirety. (Such Polish paradoxes await the patient reader.)

So what motivated Mieszko’s conversion? The baptism of “Poland” into the larger Roman Catholic family appears to have been, above all, a political decision and not simply (if such matters are ever simple!) a matter of spiritual conversion. It likely extended originally only to Mieszko’s court and entourage, who through the person of his wife and her entourage were pulled into the Christian orbit. Surely Mieszko realized that, by accepting Christianity, he would no longer be subject to incursions from the west—at least, the types of incursions from the eastern marches that doubtless had long been intended to turn these Slavic peoples from paganism to Christianity. By converting, he would deny the Holy Roman Empire the pretext to interfere with his state. The fact that the baptism came at the hands of a missionary who was under papal jurisdiction proved important. The Polish church thus would not be subordinated to the Holy Roman Empire or any other lay power. Moreover, as denizens of a Christian power the Poles could now seek to spread Christianity to other pagan tribes in the region (for example, the Pomeranians or the tribes further east), thus expanding their own influence.

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by | 23 June 2025 · 11:47 am

Buddhism in the Ryukyus

From Maritime Ryukyu, 1050–1650, by Gregory Smits (University of Hawaii Press, 2018), Kindle pp. 326-328:

Ryukyu’s temples were either Shingon or Rinzai Zen. Until approximately the sixteenth century, all or most of their abbots and priests came from Japan. During Shō Shin’s reign, native Ryukyuan priests became increasingly common, although the leadership posts in large temples typically remained in the hands of priests from Japan. As part of their training, Ryukyuan priests often resided in Japan. Therefore, Buddhist temples constituted an important network linking Ryukyu with Japan. Geographically, the most important of these priest-mediated connections to locations in Japan were Kagoshima, Suō Province in western Honshu (the domain of the Ōuchi), and especially the Kyoto Gozan temples.

Buddhist priests served as Ryukyu’s diplomats to powers in Japan, and they typically drafted and transmitted diplomatic correspondence. Because well-trained Buddhist priests could write classical Chinese, they were also in a position to facilitate trade and diplomacy with China. When in 1525 Ryukyu intervened to reduce tensions between Japan and China, priests served as the envoys. During the sixteenth century, priests performed many of the functions that resident Chinese had performed in the previous century. Recall that the population of Kumemura declined significantly during the sixteenth century.

Priests with diplomatic experience sometimes served as foreign-policy or general political advisers. For example, it is likely that the Ryukyuan Rinzai priest Kakuō (dates unknown) of Tenkaiji served as a political adviser to Shō Sei circa the 1530s. We have seen that the Satsuma Rinzai priest Nanpo Bunshi was an influential political adviser and diplomat during the years leading up to the 1609 war. When that war broke out, the king called on the Ryukyuan priest Kikuin (d. 1620) to serve as lead negotiator, in part because he had lived in Satsuma and was on good terms with Bunshi and several leaders of the invading force. Trusted by both Satsuma and the king, Kikuin served as Ryukyu’s prime minster (kokusō) until 1616.

Buddhist temples functioned as academic centers that could provide knowledge and know-how to Ryukyuan rulers. Priests were involved in culture, scholarship, and essential functions of state. Their activities included inscribing Shō Taikyū’s bells, creating the Omoro sōshi by writing down the songs, inscribing many of the monuments of Shō Shin and his successors, and drafting letters from the king to send to powers in Japan. During the sixteenth century, Buddhist priests served as tutors to elite Ryukyuans, Kaiin being the outstanding example (chapter 8). Moreover, we have seen that Enkakuji played a role in the education of the sons of elite families in Amami-Ōshima, and it likely functioned similarly vis-à-vis other islands.

Although Buddhism, Chinese thought, and native religion often occupied separate textual, rhetorical, and ritual realms, Shō Shin and his successors combined all three into a potent synthesis to enhance royal authority and defend the state. Some priests undoubtedly pursued Buddhist enlightenment through their own study and practice. Nevertheless, Buddhism in Ryukyu functioned mainly as a public state institution, not as a private spiritual path.

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by | 19 June 2025 · 9:01 am

Remaking the Ryukyu Monarchy

From Maritime Ryukyu, 1050–1650, by Gregory Smits (University of Hawaii Press, 2018), Kindle pp. 237-239:

The unstable condition of Ryukyuan kingship probably constituted Shō Shin’s most pressing early challenge. His own rise to power, of course, had been a violent intervention. During the fifteenth century, reign changes based on personal military power had been the norm. Local rulers maintained their own armies, ships, and trade networks. In Okinawa, perhaps a dozen lords possessed significant military power. Remnants of deposed rulers from the first Shō dynasty and rulers based in other islands constituted additional potential sources of instability. The monopoly on tribute trade was an advantage to whoever controlled Shuri, but it also made that person a target. Shō Shin struggled for supremacy and legitimacy throughout his long reign. Military campaigns included local warfare not appearing in the official histories, as well as invasions of Yaeyama in 1500, Kumejima (1506 and possibly earlier), and continuing military tensions in Sakishima that included an invasion of Yonaguni around 1522 (or earlier) by forces at least nominally allied with Shuri.

Perhaps the greatest act of power consolidation was Shō Shin’s causing Okinawa’s major warlords (aji) to give up their castles and relocate to Shuri in 1525 or 1526 in return for high noble status—at least according to the common story. Survey histories routinely present this relocation as a simple fact, but we have no indication that it happened as a discrete, orderly event. It is not mentioned in any monument, in the 1701 Genealogy of Chūzan, or in any other text until Sai On’s 1725 Genealogy. Even there, the claim occurs with no explanation, only in the introductory material, and not under a specific year. The 1725 Genealogy text states that the presence of warlords had long been a source of uprisings and disorder. Shō Shin relocated all of them to Shuri, disbanded their military forces, and sent his own officials out to govern their territories. Kyūyō goes into more detail, but its only basis is Sai On’s assertion in Genealogy. Perhaps Sai On had in mind Japan’s early modern sankin-kōtai system.

The relocation of the warlords to Shuri makes logical sense within the overall trajectory of Shō Shin’s reign. We know that he stored weapons in a central armory under his control and reorganized military forces and other key state functions into the hiki system. There was plenty of turbulence and factionalism in the royal court after Shō Shin’s time, but there is no indication of an independent regional power elsewhere in Okinawa that could rival Shuri. Shō Shin brought potential regional rivals such as Nakijin, the Sashiki area, and Kumejima into orbits around Shuri. Regardless of whether and how he relocated or displaced regional rulers, Shō Shin succeeded in concentrating power at the capital to such an extent that no other entity in Okinawa or within the rest of the Ryukyu islands could seriously challenge it by the end of his reign.

Shō Shin’s reign marks the first known use of written documents for government administration. He also created an eclectic ideology in support of royal power. These measures had the effect of transforming Ryukyu’s monarchs and their governments. Before Shō Shin, kings of Ryukyu resembled powerful wakō chieftains. After Shō Shin, they resembled Chinese-style heads of a centralized bureaucracy. The official histories, and most modern ones, project this later, sixteenth-century model of the monarchy back to previous generations. Historians often perform this type of maneuver.

Shō Shin’s centralizing project did not stop with his death. His successor, Shō Sei, further enhanced Shuri’s military capabilities and continued to systematize the bureaucracy and official state rituals. He created a new type of military gusuku and developed the religious ideology of royal authority known later as tedako shisō (son-of-the-sun thought). Shō Sei also brought out the first volume of the Omoro sōshi.

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by | 10 June 2025 · 6:31 am

Early Ryukyu Burial Customs

From Maritime Ryukyu, 1050–1650, by Gregory Smits (University of Hawaii Press, 2018), Kindle pp. 50-51:

The practice of placing corpses in baskets or cages and leaving them at the top of trees or poles to decompose was characteristic of the Northern Tier Cultural Zone and regions farther north. Within the Ryukyu islands, the practice has been documented in Amami-Ōshima and in parts of central and northern Okinawa. Nagoya Sagenta was a Satsuma retainer. After residing in Amami-Ōshima between 1850 and 1855, he wrote a detailed description of the local culture, Nantō zatsuwa (Tales from the southern islands). It explains that, after the death of a priestess, “her corpse is placed in a large box, which is suspended from atop a tree for three years. Then the bones are washed and placed in a jar.”

Similar practices have been documented in places along the coastline of the Japan Sea in Akita, Yamagata, and Ishikawa Prefectures. In those places the remains are hoisted aloft after cremation. In Korea, hoisting (non-cremated) bodies into trees was done in the case of deaths from smallpox and other diseases. The practice was both a de facto sanitary measure and was thought to mollify the angry deity who had caused the disease by offering up the body. A broad range of northern Asian peoples, from the Koryaks in Kamchatka west to Mongolia, traditionally disposed of corpses or bones by placing them on platforms or in trees. Bones of humans or hunted animals thus offered up toward the heavens were believed to be reborn.

There is only one known example from Fukuoka, but folklore from the region such as the legend of the “bone-hanging tree” attests to the former existence of the practice. Kashiigū, a shrine in Fukuoka City with ties to Korea, derives its name from the legend that Emperor Chūai’s coffin was hung in a shii [as in shiitake] tree (Castanopsis cuspidata, Japanese chinquapin).

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