ABSTRACT
In the valley of the Kano-gawa, some seven or eight miles from the point where the Tokaido begins to scale the Hakone slope from the west, lies the village of Nirayama. In May, or June, 1180, Yoritomo’s uncle, Yukiiye, had arrived in the East with Prince Mochihito’s summons to the Minamoto to rise in arms, and had handed a copy of the document to Yoritomo. The accounts of what then took place are obscure and conflicting. Immediately after the flight of the Tairas, the Cloistered Emperor returned to the capital escorted by Yoshinaka at the head of 30,000 men, and assumed the direction of affairs. However, it is a great mistake to talk about the extirpation of the Tairas, for Yoritomo’s most ardent supporters had been the chief of the great Taira septs domiciled in the Kwanto, who indeed, after his death, became all powerful in the Kamakura administration.
