The tenth-century rebel Taira no Masakado occupies a unique place in the literature of Japan. His reception through history is most prominent in the works of Ōkagami, Shōmonki, Konjaku Monogatari, Jinnō Shōtōki, and Ehon Maskado Ichidaiki. The author’s geographic location often determined whether they sympathized with or demonized Masakado. Their occupations also influenced how they wrote about warrior culture, particularly the custom of buntori, or the taking of heads. Ehon Masakado Ichidaiki provides not only textual accounts of the rebellion, but numerous images depicting an Edo-interpretation of Heian-period warrior culture and but also images of the buntori of Masakado and his allies’ heads. Depending on whether authors were Kyōto nobles or officials in the provinces also affected whether or not they address Masakado’s rebellion and Sumitomo’s rebellion as allied-conspiracies or as two separate occurrences. Finally, the aristocratic literature of the capital and the literature in the provinces give different reasons for Masakado’s rebellion which conform to Ted Robert Gurr’s “relative deprivation” theory, but also demonstrate the influence from Buddhist and Shintō episteme.

This thesis deals with the subject of the Tōkaidō Road in premodern Japanese literature. Tōkaidō meishoki by Asai Ryōi, which was published in six volumes in 1661, has been chosen for a closer analysis as the earliest Edo Period literary work representing this theme. The novel structure is analysed against the background of contemporary production of kanazōshi books and the genre meishoki. The work presents also a basic overview of life and work of the travelogue's author, the Buddhist philosopher Asai Ryōi, who is regarded as the first popular fiction writer of the Edo period. The thesis outlines the development of the theme of Tokaidó in classical literature and scrutinizes its further progress in premodern literature of the Edo period. It follows up also its usage in Japanese drama, as well as in visual arts. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)