ABSTRACT
The eleventh century witnessed both a culmination and a turning point in Japanese civilization. Ancient court life and culture, the products of the courtier class that served the emperor in the capital city of Kyoto, reached their zenith about the time of Imperial Regent Fujiwara no Michinaga and the writing of The Tale of Genji in the first years of the century. In the century’s second half, the samurai or warrior class that had been evolving in the provinces from earlier in the Heian period (794–1185) began to play a more prominent role in national affairs and to take the first major steps that led within a century to its emergence as the new ruling class of the country.
