Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 1.djvu/183



T has been shown that after the fall of the patriarchal system of government the administrative power reverted to the sovereign, and that a series of vigorous reforms were undertaken on the lines of Chinese civilisation. But the Emperor did not long remain autocratic, nor did many of the reforms prove permanent. Mommu's (697–707) democratic edict, declaring that the throne rested on the people, had scarcely been acclaimed by the nation when the Fujiwara family began to wield power which soon assumed extraordinary proportions.

This family was founded by Kamatari. He came into notice by compassing the destruction of the last of the patriarchal clans (the Soga), and fate, with her usual irony, decreed that he himself should be the founder of a clan beside whose usurpations those of the Soga, or any other Japanese clan, look, insignificant. Kamatari traced his descent back to the days of Jimmu, but even if