Sit of Nara

After the battles of Uji of June 23rd, 1180, during which Minamoto No Yorimasa had faced a small army Taira with the assistance of the monks of the Mii-dera and other temples, them Taira, victorious but furious to be faced, decided to give the attack and to burn Mii-dera, before going to the old capital Nara . Taira were then faced by warlike monks of almost all the principal monasteries and temples of Nara. Will conceal No Shigehira and Tomomori, two wire of the chief of the Taira clan, Kiyomori, ordered the seat.

The monks dug ditches in the roads and built many forms of impromptu defenses. They fought mainly with arcs and arrows and Naginata, whereas them Taira were with horse, which gave them a great advantage. In spite of the numerical superiority of the monks, and their strategic defenses, their enemies managed to almost destroy all the temples of the city: to put an end to the ceaseless combat, Taira No Shigehira ends up ordering to put fire at the Kōfuku-ji and the Tōdai-ji. Only the Enryaku-ji managed to push back the attackers and to survive.

The Heike Monogatari describes the destruction of the Daibutsu of Tōdai-ji:

“the colossal statue of the Buddha of gold and copper Vairocana, whose arched head bored the clouds, where shone the crowned jewel of its raised face, melted with heat, so that its symbols of full moon fell on the ground in lower part, whereas its body founded in a formless mass.”

In all, 3500 people died in the fire of Nara.

References

Stephen Turnbull, Japanese Warrior Monks AD 949-1603 , Osprey Publishing, Oxford, 2003.

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