ABSTRACT
During the late seventh and early eighth centuries, the Japanese state compiled and promulgated a series of legal codes based largely on Chinese models developed under the Sui and Tang dynasties. With the rise and expansion of the Sui and Tang empires in China came a general sense of increased tension that reverberated throughout all of East Asia. In more recent decades, however, historians analyzing ritsuryō institutions have emphasized the points of departure that distinguished the Japanese polity from those of China, and maintained that the Taihō and Yōrō ritsuryō represented careful adaptations, rather than simple adoptions, of Chinese practices. Historians have also explored the relationship between the emperor and the aristocracy under the ritsuryō state. Until a generation ago, there was nearly universal agreement among historians that such changes collectively signaled the end of the ritsuryō state.
