@@DaveSCameron The Caliphs actually had only limited religious authority, they were the political head of Islam. Unlike the Pope who can issue his own interpretations of religious law.
To maybe fix your company analogy to better function: a kingdom is like a single corporation and it's king/queen is like the CEO, whereas an empire is like a corporate group like a large multinational, e.g. Samsung, and the Emperor is the CEO.
No. Historically a kingdom operated very much like a mafia family. In fact, the mafia is actually organized according to feudal power structures, it is not a coincidence. The boss is the king. The capos are the lords. The made men are the knights. The associates are the men at arms.
@@crazydinosaur8945 The Holy Roman Empire was a collection of vasal states that held allegiance to the central strongman. In mafia terms it would be comparable to the commision that ran organized crime in the 30s. The emperor is the equivalent of a "godfather" type figure.
Note that not only is it possible to have an Emperor with no Empire, it is (or at least it was) also possible to have an Empire without and Emperor. For centuries, Portugal and France had empires, and they were at least in some periods, specifically referred to as "Empires", but both Portugal and France were not headed by emperors (in the case of France, excluding the Napoleonic periods), but by kings (or queens). And even when they became republics, they kept calling their extensive overseas territories as "Empires" (until it went out of fashion after WWII, and they started calling them "overseas provinces", "overseas departments", "overseas territories", "overseas collectivities"...).
Same goes with Spain's case over a numerous amount of times in their history Try explaining what the Spanish King Carlos I / Kaiser Karl V's overall titles were, or when short-termed Presidents and lengthily ruling Caudillos ruled a dwindling number of colonies in the last two and a half centuries.
@@shinsenshogun900 Kaiser comes from the word Cesar (which beside being a name, was also a term for emperor) which in classical latin is pronounced something like Kaisar, so you could make an argument that he was a emperor.
An even more famous example is Rome itself. Most of Roman expansion happened during its Republican phase which means a lot of what we associate with the Roman Empire (legions, large territory, etc) technically predate the Empire. Nonetheless, most of the time people still call that Rome "Roman Empire" because it is simpler that way and because, for all purposes, it was an empire already. It just didn't have an emperor yet. (well, even more technically, there was "emperors" in the republic, but they were military commanders. The word had a different meaning back then)
@@heatth1474 Officially, Rome remained a Republic. The choice of "emperor" as the designation for the head of state was precisely to pretend they hadn't reinstated a monarchy: the guy was just a "commander of the troops" selected by the Senate. (And indeed, rarely did the "throne" pass from father to son, as standard in European monarchies.)
I find it interesting that the official name of Ireland is just ‘Ireland’ and not ‘the republic of Ireland’, which is widely used informally to avoid confusion between the country of Ireland and the the Island of Ireland, which included Northern Ireland (part of the United Kingdom)
@@themackie2763 so what does that have to do with Japan's empire status? quoting funny videos about a topic that is barely even related isn't funny on its own.
@@siyacer It has to do with the end of the Tokugawa shogunate and the start of the Meiji restoration. For that period, only the portugese and later the Dutch were able to trade in one small area of the country and the country was closed off to foreign influence. Then America showed up and many people died to 'put the emperor back in power'. Then Japan started to expand...
@@SeanNH94 I was once a treehouse. I lived in a cake. But I never saw the way the orange slayed the rake. I was only three years dead, but I told a tale. And now listen, little child, to the safety rail.
TLDR: just call the japanese head of state as "tenn-nou", as they use themselves. and "nippon"for "japan". "emperor" being more powerful than a "king" wasn't always the case. the latter roman rulers called themselves "emperors" as they were that: "imperator" i.e. commander, of an army. the romans disliked kings because of their republic history. king implies that the person has "divine right" to rule. but commander (emperor) was simply a military title. when the two got switched up, who knows? i think it was europe's obsession of being a roman imperator.
I disagree. Firstly, many people might not recognize that word so it's better to use "emperor". Also, the word "king" doesn't necessarily imply claims of divine right (though in the past such claims were common). The Roman rulers didn't only call themselves "Imperator" but had a bunch of titles, even though that word is what got loaned to a number of European languages (but a good number of European languages borrowed "Caesar" instead to mean emperor).
@@krakendragonslayer1909 The Roman rulers are called "emperor" in English. In reality they held various titles that changed over time. But we don't even have to consider Rome. The Holy Roman Empire was (at least nominally) headed by an Emperor and they were Christians. Europe also has had a bunch of kings in pre-Christian times.
A little quirk of history is that most Japanese Land-Grabs after 1940 in South-East Asia were because they wanted to secure access to oil fields in the area. I wonder what would have happened if they knew they already had vast oil resources in Manchuria, for example in the Daqing Oil Field, but that was only discovered in 1959.
Technically speaking, Canada’s official name is still the Dominion of Canada. Many of you may scoff at this, because it’s not used in laws, titulature, etc. but no law was ever changed that official designated the nation as simply “Canada”, meaning our full, never used anymore, according to the letter of the law name is the Dominion of Canada
This is interesting what you said here about the "Empire" part of the name, as Poland for example, sometime still calls Japan "CESARSTWO JAPONII" OR "CESARSTWO JAPOŃSKIE" - CESARSTWO meaning EMPIRE in Polish ;)
I was interested in this same question a number of years ago, and what I came up with is that an "empire" is a situation where one country (or sometimes city-state) directly politically controls not only itself but other countries (and/or city-states) as well, usually with the subordinate countries retaining some semblance of their own governmental structure-and always retaining something of their own national identity and cultural distinctiveness. From their point of view, you could think of an empire as "rule by outsiders." From the point of view of the ruling country, you can think of an empire as "goodies, goodies, goodies!" Empires typically exist either as plunder engines or colonization engines (or both), depending on the population size, wealth, cultural disposition, and level of development of the countries being annexed into the empire. Historically, the function of an empire is to enrich the political enter (the ruling country) and/or expand the nation of that country (i.e., its ethnicity and culture) to broader territories. For this reasons, empires have historically tended to be even more genocidal and racist than your typical country. But it's not all bad. Empires, at least in their maintenance phases (not so much their growth and collapse phases) also provide stability and prosperity on an international scale, and periods of history with large, pronounced empires have tended to coincide with periods of cultural and economic development, higher standards of living, and population growth. In fact, many of the most celebrated nations in history were empires-even if they didn't call themselves "empires"-with most of the rest being "hegemonies" (again whether or not so-called hegemonies formally), which are like empires except that instead of direct political administration of the satellite countries as a single, large polity there is a softer, economic-based control and the semblance of political sovereignty. The concept of empire stacks with, and is not exclusive to, the designations of polities. So you can have a republic that's also an empire, a monarchy that's also an empire, etc. "Empire" is inherently a supernational designation. You won't find many countries in history that called themselves only an empire, with no separate designation for the ruling country (or, sometimes, the ruling city-state). And, like I mentioned, an empire doesn't have to call itself an empire to actually be an empire. Many Scots and Northern Irish and even some Welsh consider the United Kingdom itself (and not the British Empire) to be a case of rule-by-outsiders, i.e., an empire in all but name. Modern-day Russia is definitely an empire with respect to its many conquered "republics" (and is also a hegemony with respect to its non-annexed control of satellite states like Belarus). The USSR which preceded modern-day Russia was also an empire, despite rhetorically loathing the concept of imperialism and using "imperialist" as a slur against Western nations. China is an empire, with its core Han provinces directly ruling over more distance and/or politically fraught regions-having recently escalated its hegemony over Hong Kong, for instance, into a state of outright annexation into its empire. The United States is a fascinating case that really blurs the line between empire and hegemony, because while the US doesn't politically administer many countries outside its own borders, it goes far beyond a typical hegemony in its global economic and military dominance. Japan really was a major empire after the Meiji Restoration, controlling Korea, large swaths of China, and other territories all the way through to World War II. And it was an empire prior to that, on a smaller scale, on its own islands, with respect to the various tribal peoples who lived there, whenever a strong national center predominated, historically in Edo. In this way, you can see that, sometimes, the end of an empire is not collapse and dissolution but rather a true cultural unification of the various countries into a single one. The government transforms into something less one-directional (i.e., for the benefit of the center), with the different peoples developing a sense of national identity, and the political center returning some resources out to the provinces, or even giving them more resources than they feed in. This has happened in virtually all countries that became large: Modern-day England itself, for instance, once consisted of many different nations who regarded themselves as separate polities, until eventually a "high king" united them all under the banner of England. That was an act of empire, and for a time "England" was not yet truly a single nation.
You appreciate the misinformation that the reason is "history", and NOT "because WW2 lol". Which is the REASON Japan HAS an emperor, even IF it isn't an empire. Because the constitutionalist VOTE sought to firebomb civilians to stop ITSELF from firebombing MORE CIVILIANS; that's how those politics roll, "because WW2 lol". And Vietnam, and Iraq, AND Afganistan, trololololol. Your vote matters. Just don't occupy any tall buildings or iPhone factories, or you're gonna feel in your skin what current hegemony does with "non-emperors" of not-called-so EMPIRES. There was no hospital in Pearl Harbor where something like that could be felt, but that's no surprise because there's no room to spread MORE democracy THERE: it was ALREADY almost entirely militarized with state weaponry, the only asset there to be attacked. Now that the European energy has been forcefully funneled more and more through Ukraine where hunter keeps his laptops, THAT became the stage for seizure of such assets. Ones that Russia was not ALLOWED to build elsewhere during "peace" time, much like Ukraine was not ALLOWED into NATO, by NATO. That's some history to appreciate, but be fast, while it still remains unwritten "by the victor".
Re: The business analogy - you missed a trick there. A small company's CEO is in charge of ... that small company. They might have a few other CE's in the mix, by and large the company is mostly self-contained as a singular entity. An Emperor is more like the CEO of a conglomerate. The conglomerate has individual divisions, subdivisions, and even entire other companies under the conglomerates control/ownership.
I am Japanese. I've been wondering about it for a long time too. After the war ended, it became necessary to revise the Constitution of the Empire of Japan. At that time, I think that "Empire" was omitted because "Japan" was written in the revision draft made by GHQ.
The obvious reason is that Japan isn't really an empire anymore and calling it the "Constitutional Empire of Japan" sounds kinda weird so they just stuck with "Japan"
Empreror is equivalent to Shogun, in both the political and the military extent of the title. Tenno is something more like a Caliph (as someone noted in another comment) and not a Pope, and this considering the nature of the functions associated with the title Tenno/Caliph
I never thought of the resemblance between Caliph and Tenno. Then the Ottoman dynasty and its aftermath were a case of what if the Shogun had taken away and merged the title of Tenno with itself. Interesting.
天皇/Tenno means emperor of Heaven, meanwhile the emperor of China is called 天子/son of Heaven, so this title seems to be exaggerating and ridiculous for other nations in East Asia,so ancient China, Korea, Vietnam ad other sinic nations just called emperor of Japan as king of Wa/倭王，
By the way, I may be wrong, but I do believe that, because they haven't changed it since they were a dominion, Canada does have other words in their official name, being officially named the "Dominion of Canada".
The word emperor in Japanese is 'Tenno' composed of the Kanji for Heaven/Celestial and sovereign/God. So Tenno means 'Heavenly sovereign'. The term Tenno is translated into English as Emperor but the western conception (inspired by the ancient Roman concept of emperor or 'imperator', imperium and empire) and is different from the east Asian concept. The term Tenno is inspired by the Chinese term Huangdi (or Kotei in Japanese) which means August/ Divine sovereign. The terms Tenno and Kotei (Huangdi) are better translated as Thearch (God-Ruler) than emperor. So on a technicality, Japan and China (formerly) are theocracies. The Japanese emperor is believed to have descended from the sun Goddess Amateratsu through her grandson Jinmu. The Chinese emperor was believed to have been appointed by heaven to rule the earth and was called the Son of heaven (Tianzhi in Chinese or Tenshi in Japanese). The Chinese emperors need not claim any grand descent from a god or illustrious ancestor to be considered a legitimate ruler. The Chinese they believed that anyone who ruled well and with benevolence had the blessing of heaven thus a person of humble birth may ascend to the position of emperor if a previous emperor or dynasty became unworthy to rule (either through despotism, negligence or incompetence). The concept of empire the east Asians have differs from the western conception In the west empires are formed by dominating foreign territories by military conquest, alliance/protectorate treaties, imposing laws, public levies and establishing governing infrastructures to integrate new territories into the general governing sphere of the conquering country. In the sinosphere the concept of Tianxia or Tenka (Under heaven) is the east Asian equivalent of the western concept of imperialism and empire. But it relies less on conquest (whether militarily or politically) rather it relies on a form of theoretical hegemony of all countries and peoples. The east Asian concept of Tianxia is that of ecumenical (world-spanning) empire that is already established and all countries and people are already a part of it owing fealty to the Tenno/Huangdi. For example, in imperial China the view would be that all countries even those as far away as Britain or France where part of the Chinese empire despite China having no political involvement in those respective countries governance but because they exist 'under heaven' Tianxia they, by default, are ruled by China and hence the emperor Huangdi. This is because the Chinese believed heaven rules the earth and the emperor was an earthly agent (son of) heaven thus the emperor ruled over all the world. In the Chinese view, they viewed the world as owing fealty to the emperor. They viewed is the emperor at the centre, surrounding him is his capital city (specifically the imperial court/the imperial government), surrounding that the immediate country the emperor ruled (China), surrounding China are tributary states (established countries and nations with organized governments) and on the outside of this the uncivilised barbarians (specifically nomads with no established country or organized forms of government). Over all the emperor was said to rule just as heaven looms over the earth and directs it (eg the movements of the heavenly bodies manifested in the solstices and equinoxes which determines the seasons and chronology of earth). The Byzantine empire is only (now extinct) western country /culture that had a concept similar to Tianxia/Tenka, that is a theoretically ecumenical and hegemonic 'empire'. A belief that the world is ruled by the Christian God and the Byzantine emperor has been delegated to rule the earth on God's behalf and that all countries and nations are (theoretically) part of the Byzantine empire, ruled by the Byzantine emperor and hence ruled by God. So in all, the english translation of sino-asian word for 'emperor' is inaccurate and the sino-asian concept of empire doesn't translate well into English either. The better and more accurate terms for Tenno would be Thearch/Theocrat instead of 'emperor' and theocracy/ august country instead of 'empire'.
I thought Canada's official name was the Dominion of Canada. It's very really used but I think some times at the Olympics opening / closing ceremonies Canada is listed under D instead of C.
China had an emperor & was considered the Middle Kingdom by the Chinese. Also it seems that the ruler of China was called the Emperor before Northern China united with South China. Sorta like any king of ancient Egypt was called the pharaoh.
Actually the Chinese use of "Kingdom" is losely used and not translated well in English. Its written form in character 國, actually means more of a realm or country than it does kingdom. Because it's also used for the USA, or 美國。Before recent times, Chinese usually refer to themselves by the ruling dynasty. For example, in the Han dynasty, Chinese would call themselves the Han people or the Han. And now it's associated with the Han Chinese ethnic group. In a way, the concept of the China nation-state is a recent idea.
It's more of an old official name in my understanding. Canada was a dominion of the British empire until fairly recently, which meant it didn't have legal independence even if it largely had home rule. So calling Canada "The Dominion of Canada" now would be innaccurate rather than formal
1:26 I don't know about the others, but Canada and New Zealand both have official titles. The Dominion of Canada and Dominion of New Zealand respectively.
As a Canadian I was pretty sure we were just Canada, but I had doubts and was just trying to double check on my phone when you answered my curiosity lol
And that is strange indeed, as the expectation would be either Kingdom of Canada or Commonwealth of Canada! But I believe the shift to "just" Canada didn't happen until rather recently, IIRC, I think I remember something to that avail, but I might also be wrong. Greetings from the Federal Republic of Germany!
@@lucemiserlohn We used to be called the Dominion of Canada, but kinda just... stopped using that in the 50s. Technically speaking it's very unclear whether or not we were EVER the "Dominion of Canada" since our copy of the law has that exact phrase zero times, but dominion was SPECIFICALLY used as it was a compromise between the monarchists (who wanted us to be the Kingdom of Canada) and those afraid of offending the stauncher anti-monarchists in the USA.
@@AgaresOaks That is very true. When Canada became legally completely independent from the United Kingdom in 1982 there was talk leading up to the new constitution that some in the Canadian government wanted to name the country Kingdom of Canada. The US State Department out pressure on the Canadian government not to do so. The US said there will be no kingdoms in the Western Hemisphere. Thus, when the Queen of Canada signed your new constitution into law you became forever more just Canada.
Japan itself calls its Foundion day as "Empire Day" (Kigensetsu) (紀元節) or National Foundation Day which celebrated every February 11 with Emperor Jimmu from 660 BCE
In retrospect, there's never British emperors but why's there a British Empire? Chinese empire, many Chinese dynasties ruled by emperor Shihuangdi of Qin dynasty, Emperor Wudi of Han dynasty, Emperor Emperor Gaozong of Tang dynasty, Emperor Kangxi of Ching dynasty. Vietnam's Emperor Ly Loi of Ly dynasty, Emperor Bao Dai of Nguyen dynasty.
Definitely needs a lot more historical nuance. The reason why 帝国 is used for Japan back in the day is complicated, but a lot of the reason is because the neighboring 帝国 did not bother actually competing the title. Empires are essentially the most reasonable top-level entity of governance which almost always insists on a bureaucratic core rather than mere inheritance and devolved feudal/tribal powers. Japan being called an empire is an attempt to bridge the concept while adapting to what Japan self-identified as. In the case of Japan, it was so far removed from everything else that it only had one single entity it needed to resist to call itself an empire, and China never cared enough to strip the title away (they cared when it came to Korea, Ryukyu, and Vietnam). So nominally they've been an empire, just that they became a _colonial_ empire after the Meiji restoration. Colonial empires are their own thing. China called itself an empire but it had to contest that title with other empires nearby, most notably the Mongols and Tibetans. This stopped happening after nationalism started to take over, which is basically the imperfect, often misunderstood Asiatic adaptation to a purely European concept. The consequence is that these Asian polities stopped calling themselves empires as part of this movement, China included. Japan, wanting to be a colonial empire, sought after the title, and after being defeated the US wanted to remove its ability to be a colonial empire. But never has Japan been a true empire in the classical sense, as it never had to contest that title earnestly (it is really only meaningful in continental Eurasia where there are too many polities). So for all intents and purposes, the emperor of Japan was basically a hereditary king who is more or less a Shinto pope today (a religion that was also wildly transformed by reforms into State Shinto).
It's technically a theocracy because in Shintō the emperor is descendant of the gods though it's a democratic theocracy because of the presence of a prime minister
Japan being a theocracy would imply that the emperor still holds a fairly significant degree of political power. He doesn't... anymore. It's a parliamentary democracy under a constitutional monarchy
@@velazquezarmouries you could technically claim that since Elizabeth II is the Head of the Church of England, that would be the same situation. obviously they (the Queen and the emperor) occupy much different positions in their respective religions, but technically if you can describe Japan as a theocracy then so is the UK and Norway for example
Yes. A limited theocracy. This problem stems from attempting to translate Tenno. We don't translate Pope, Caliph or Dalai Lama because we acknowledge that these positions do not have Western equivalents. So, Japan is not an empire because it doesn't have an emperor.
Another definition of empire is a polity that has several other polities within it that have different cultures and ethnicities. So, postwar Japan isn't an Empire because the country is largely ethnically homogeneous thus that title being useless. The colonial powers and Rome were empires through and through with that definition.
A small thing I noticed about the speech pattern in this video is how it extends the final syllable of a senteeeence. Best example from 6:10 when two sentences ends with "Japaaaan".
While Imperare farthest origin of the word "Emperor", Emperor actually stems from a application of the latin word "Imperator"(commander/he who commands). Julius Ceasar was for example hailed as an Imperator (and the names became linked to one another, see usage lf emperor in german Caesar > "Kaiser" or imperator > emperor in English
Only commenting this because some started the 'Ireland official name is...' debate. I like to point that Ireland had an Emperor at one point, I believe it was some time after 1002 until 1014. And yes the most famous High king of Ireland was the only Emperor of the Irish. Interestingly Brian Ború never had the title of High king, his titles were King of Munster, Master of Ireland, Emperor of the Irish
The title "天皇＝ten-nou"is not strictly an emperor It has the meaning of "the son of heaven", which means the one who has been given the rulership of the earth from heaven, and it is a name to oppose the powerful ancient Chinese emperor who ruled the surrounding countries. It is a name used in letters sent to China to express that ``the Japanese monarch has an equal relationship that does not yield to China (then Tang).'' The name is still used today ※"the son of heaven" In the English translation, it is described as heaven, but heaven is Takamagahara that appears in ancient Japanese mythology. There is no equivalent English translation It is slightly different from heaven in Christianity etc.
And then there was the Holy Roman Empire, which was not Roman, not holy and not [really] an empire. More to the point for British empire enthusiasts, there was Empress Maud [Matilda], who was supposed to become Queen of England, but most of the nobles broke their oaths, revolted and caused an English civil war. Princess Matilda was therefore queen/not queen, empress not empress and mother of a British Norman/French.Angevin King.
@@andrewjgrimm it was more because all the other cool kids (France, Germany, Austria, the Ottomans) had Emperors, but England's unique political history was anathema to giving the monarch more power or authority (Magna Carta and all that). The English were okay with an Empress of India because their mindset was "you cant be OUR emperor, but you can be THEIR emperor."
Historically, Tennō have existed for 1400 years, and at that time, Japan had several ethnic groups in disarray: Yamato, Kumaso, Hayato, Emishi... In that sense, Tennō was an emperor at that time.
“Koku” 国 means “country.” It is used in the Japanese names for other countries such as Kankoku 韓国 for Korea, Chuugoku 中国 for China, and Beikoku 米国 for the U.S., as well as internal regional names, such as Shikoku 四国. “Empire” is “teikoku” 帝国. You can see it used in the names of some old establishments such as the Teikoku Hotel / Imperial Hotel in Hibiya, Tokyo.
And country without a long official name I end up calling, "State of X" so in this case, I'd refer to Japan, as: "State of Japan". Except this doesn't work as well for Federal States, Like Canada, which I would call the "Federation of Canada," as Canada really has 10 States, It's 10 Provinces, and isn't a single State like Japan, Hungary, or New Zealand are.
Even after WW2, Japan called themselves Empire of Japan for a while. That was until the Allies GHQ commanded Japanese government to stop calling themselves Empire at May 1947.
I always understood that the Emperor of Japan was an Emperor, simply because the Emperor of China was an Emperor. Thus when the English/Latin word was introduced to Japan there was no way the Japanese would accept a title that would put their ruler lesser than the Chinese Emperor.
And enpire doesn’t mean loads of land it means a strong country that is as strong as an empire they can be small or big the country with strong military or political connections.
because before 1895, Japan only had 4 main islands, it is ridiculous to call Japan as empire, when she had just the size of a province of her neighbor,
The Allies decided to leave Hirohito alone since even laying a finger on him will most likely anger the populace and spark some sort of revolt, which the Allies would obviously NOT want to happen
Japan wasn't called an empire when it was ruled by the Shogun, even though the Imperial Household has existed for at least 1500 years. The Japanese Emperor is more accurately the high priest of Shinto.
This video is so bizarrely focused... like for example it ignores that Japan was forced to give up sakoku by western aggression which changes the context. There's just a lot of things like that in this video. The Meiji restoration did give power to the imperial family but by WW2 the emperor was more of a figurehead and for some reason that is left out entirely. Even in the beginning Nobunaga isn't mentioned once despite the fact he unified 90% of Japan and is seen as the unifier. I don't know, it feels like someone took everything from wikipedia but had no background knowledge to apply context to it... and like even the pronunciation of Hirohito, you would think this person has never heard of Japan outside wikipedia.
Well they DID have an empire at one point. But then the war crimes happened and we are NOT letting them even think about going through that again. No way, no how.
Want it an empire even before conquering Hokkaido? I remember Japan being called an empire when it was just the main island and the islands to the south.
It is a bit pointless to think too much about the western concept of emperor or empire. After all, a tennou was already called "emperor" before Japan became an empire. Japan once had many lands which can be called "empire" but it's rather accidental. Originally, it is nothing to do with the western "imperator". The title 天皇(tennou) was originally started to use claiming the equivalence or independence to the Chinese emperor 皇帝(koutei) and Chinese empire in the ancient diplomacy, ( otherwise a king (王) is a subject to the Chinese emperor ). The kanji words 天皇 and 皇帝 have the same origin and hence almost the same meaning like "king of king", Japan just made up slightly different terminology than 皇帝, not to provoke unnecessary tension. Later, the Chinese emperor was translated as emperor, and then the same rule applied to tennou. That's it.
Soundwise, yes, but with Kanji, Tokyo (東京/とうきょう) and Kyoto (京都/きょうと) have totally different meanings. The former is "City of East/Eastern City", and the latter is "the City." You cannot tell that "TO" in both names are not the same by just looking at those words written in alphabet. (Actually the sounds are different, too. One is the long "To" and the other short.)
Little Brother complex looking at Big Bro China. China as the central power for millennia in East Asia recognized kings (王) in surrounding nations. Japan thought it was too good for such an arrangement and used the term 天皇, similar to the term used in China for emperor 皇帝.
The title is like him trying to deny that WW2 even exists. I mean, they did so some shenanigans in China, but like totally did nothing, saids Japan. They secretly do the worst atrocity [Rape of Nanking]
Did = Did-e Asia = Asiaarr Within = Wivin All = All-er Ruler = Wuler Them = Dem-er Thing = Fingge One would think pronunciation would be important to a channel all about names.
I know you all want to write History of Japan quotes so leave them here to help build engagement on this video.
K.
Japan is an island by the sea filled with volcanoes and it's _beautiful_
Are you on Rumble or Odysee at all?
VOTE NOW ON YOUR PHONES
@@matthewstar1277 and then everybody voted so hard at the palace caught on fire and burnt down
the Emperor of Japan functions nowadays as a Temporal Head of Faith. More like a Caliph than a Pope
Caliphs and Pope's are the same
@@DaveSCameron Not at all. Caliph is a title that is usually hereditary, while the Papacy is not. The Papacy is an elective title.
@@camhain7643 oh OK, I gotcha, best wishes 🙏
@@camhain7643 Caliphs can be heredity or elective. It depends on who holds the caliphate.
@@DaveSCameron The Caliphs actually had only limited religious authority, they were the political head of Islam. Unlike the Pope who can issue his own interpretations of religious law.
To maybe fix your company analogy to better function: a kingdom is like a single corporation and it's king/queen is like the CEO, whereas an empire is like a corporate group like a large multinational, e.g. Samsung, and the Emperor is the CEO.
Yeah, the king is the CEO of a company and the Emperor is the Chairman of the holding group that owns that company.
No. Historically a kingdom operated very much like a mafia family. In fact, the mafia is actually organized according to feudal power structures, it is not a coincidence. The boss is the king. The capos are the lords. The made men are the knights. The associates are the men at arms.
@@Tugela60 what's the analogy for the HRE (Holy Roman Empire)
@@crazydinosaur8945 The Holy Roman Empire was a collection of vasal states that held allegiance to the central strongman. In mafia terms it would be comparable to the commision that ran organized crime in the 30s. The emperor is the equivalent of a "godfather" type figure.
@@Tugela60 except with no de facto power most of the time
Note that not only is it possible to have an Emperor with no Empire, it is (or at least it was) also possible to have an Empire without and Emperor.
For centuries, Portugal and France had empires, and they were at least in some periods, specifically referred to as "Empires", but both Portugal and France were not headed by emperors (in the case of France, excluding the Napoleonic periods), but by kings (or queens). And even when they became republics, they kept calling their extensive overseas territories as "Empires" (until it went out of fashion after WWII, and they started calling them "overseas provinces", "overseas departments", "overseas territories", "overseas collectivities"...).
Same goes with Spain's case over a numerous amount of times in their history
Try explaining what the Spanish King Carlos I / Kaiser Karl V's overall titles were, or when short-termed Presidents and lengthily ruling Caudillos ruled a dwindling number of colonies in the last two and a half centuries.
@@shinsenshogun900 Kaiser comes from the word Cesar (which beside being a name, was also a term for emperor) which in classical latin is pronounced something like Kaisar, so you could make an argument that he was a emperor.
@@hitthemill8595 Yes, a Habsburg emperor, though this union between Spain and the HRE would not last into the end of their times
An even more famous example is Rome itself. Most of Roman expansion happened during its Republican phase which means a lot of what we associate with the Roman Empire (legions, large territory, etc) technically predate the Empire. Nonetheless, most of the time people still call that Rome "Roman Empire" because it is simpler that way and because, for all purposes, it was an empire already. It just didn't have an emperor yet.
(well, even more technically, there was "emperors" in the republic, but they were military commanders. The word had a different meaning back then)
@@heatth1474 Officially, Rome remained a Republic. The choice of "emperor" as the designation for the head of state was precisely to pretend they hadn't reinstated a monarchy: the guy was just a "commander of the troops" selected by the Senate.
(And indeed, rarely did the "throne" pass from father to son, as standard in European monarchies.)
I find it interesting that the official name of Ireland is just ‘Ireland’ and not ‘the republic of Ireland’, which is widely used informally to avoid confusion between the country of Ireland and the the Island of Ireland, which included Northern Ireland (part of the United Kingdom)
I found it weird when the Northern Irish both Pro and Catholic calls the Rep of Ireland. South and rarely Republic
Because they still think of their country as the whole of the island.
@@sdspivey It did start out that way, but Ireland (the country) has relinquished its claim on Northern Ireland after the Good Friday Agreement
@@vatnidd The government has, the people haven't.
@@vatnidd sort of. They also stated that Northern Ireland may join Republic of Ireland if the people there want to.
“Open the country. Stop having it be closed.”
And thus, Japan opened itself to the world.
How is this related?
@@siyacer it’s a reference to bill wurtz because people think it’s funny
@@themackie2763 so what does that have to do with Japan's empire status? quoting funny videos about a topic that is barely even related isn't funny on its own.
@@siyacer It has to do with the end of the Tokugawa shogunate and the start of the Meiji restoration. For that period, only the portugese and later the Dutch were able to trade in one small area of the country and the country was closed off to foreign influence. Then America showed up and many people died to 'put the emperor back in power'. Then Japan started to expand...
@@michaelmiller7465 that takes enough mental gymnastics to show that clearly isn't the purpose of the comment.
It's because the emperor got a new groove, of course.
😂
The Emperor's New Clothes, but with less nudity and more llama
@@FluffyEmmy1116 ALWAYS need more Llama in my life
@@SeanNH94 I was once a treehouse. I lived in a cake. But I never saw the way the orange slayed the rake. I was only three years dead, but I told a tale. And now listen, little child, to the safety rail.
Lame
I think a better analogy with the business world be to compare a kingdom to a company and an empire with a holding/conglomerate.
TLDR: just call the japanese head of state as "tenn-nou", as they use themselves. and "nippon"for "japan".
"emperor" being more powerful than a "king" wasn't always the case. the latter roman rulers called themselves "emperors" as they were that: "imperator" i.e. commander, of an army. the romans disliked kings because of their republic history.
king implies that the person has "divine right" to rule. but commander (emperor) was simply a military title. when the two got switched up, who knows? i think it was europe's obsession of being a roman imperator.
I disagree. Firstly, many people might not recognize that word so it's better to use "emperor". Also, the word "king" doesn't necessarily imply claims of divine right (though in the past such claims were common). The Roman rulers didn't only call themselves "Imperator" but had a bunch of titles, even though that word is what got loaned to a number of European languages (but a good number of European languages borrowed "Caesar" instead to mean emperor).
Emperor (imparator) is any kind of souvereign ruler who is not Christian, if he is Christian then he is a king.
@@krakendragonslayer1909 Not sure if you're joking or not but many Roman emperors were Christians.
@@seneca983 But none of them wielded title "emperor", they were "princeps".
"Emperor" means "ruler",
while "princeps" means "president"
@@krakendragonslayer1909 The Roman rulers are called "emperor" in English. In reality they held various titles that changed over time. But we don't even have to consider Rome. The Holy Roman Empire was (at least nominally) headed by an Emperor and they were Christians. Europe also has had a bunch of kings in pre-Christian times.
A little quirk of history is that most Japanese Land-Grabs after 1940 in South-East Asia were because they wanted to secure access to oil fields in the area. I wonder what would have happened if they knew they already had vast oil resources in Manchuria, for example in the Daqing Oil Field, but that was only discovered in 1959.
Give me a Time Machine and I'll make sure to find it earlier
Technically speaking, Canada’s official name is still the Dominion of Canada. Many of you may scoff at this, because it’s not used in laws, titulature, etc. but no law was ever changed that official designated the nation as simply “Canada”, meaning our full, never used anymore, according to the letter of the law name is the Dominion of Canada
This is interesting what you said here about the "Empire" part of the name, as Poland for example, sometime still calls Japan "CESARSTWO JAPONII" OR "CESARSTWO JAPOŃSKIE" - CESARSTWO meaning EMPIRE in Polish ;)
I was interested in this same question a number of years ago, and what I came up with is that an "empire" is a situation where one country (or sometimes city-state) directly politically controls not only itself but other countries (and/or city-states) as well, usually with the subordinate countries retaining some semblance of their own governmental structure-and always retaining something of their own national identity and cultural distinctiveness. From their point of view, you could think of an empire as "rule by outsiders."
From the point of view of the ruling country, you can think of an empire as "goodies, goodies, goodies!" Empires typically exist either as plunder engines or colonization engines (or both), depending on the population size, wealth, cultural disposition, and level of development of the countries being annexed into the empire. Historically, the function of an empire is to enrich the political enter (the ruling country) and/or expand the nation of that country (i.e., its ethnicity and culture) to broader territories. For this reasons, empires have historically tended to be even more genocidal and racist than your typical country.
But it's not all bad. Empires, at least in their maintenance phases (not so much their growth and collapse phases) also provide stability and prosperity on an international scale, and periods of history with large, pronounced empires have tended to coincide with periods of cultural and economic development, higher standards of living, and population growth. In fact, many of the most celebrated nations in history were empires-even if they didn't call themselves "empires"-with most of the rest being "hegemonies" (again whether or not so-called hegemonies formally), which are like empires except that instead of direct political administration of the satellite countries as a single, large polity there is a softer, economic-based control and the semblance of political sovereignty.
The concept of empire stacks with, and is not exclusive to, the designations of polities. So you can have a republic that's also an empire, a monarchy that's also an empire, etc. "Empire" is inherently a supernational designation. You won't find many countries in history that called themselves only an empire, with no separate designation for the ruling country (or, sometimes, the ruling city-state). And, like I mentioned, an empire doesn't have to call itself an empire to actually be an empire. Many Scots and Northern Irish and even some Welsh consider the United Kingdom itself (and not the British Empire) to be a case of rule-by-outsiders, i.e., an empire in all but name. Modern-day Russia is definitely an empire with respect to its many conquered "republics" (and is also a hegemony with respect to its non-annexed control of satellite states like Belarus). The USSR which preceded modern-day Russia was also an empire, despite rhetorically loathing the concept of imperialism and using "imperialist" as a slur against Western nations. China is an empire, with its core Han provinces directly ruling over more distance and/or politically fraught regions-having recently escalated its hegemony over Hong Kong, for instance, into a state of outright annexation into its empire. The United States is a fascinating case that really blurs the line between empire and hegemony, because while the US doesn't politically administer many countries outside its own borders, it goes far beyond a typical hegemony in its global economic and military dominance.
Japan really was a major empire after the Meiji Restoration, controlling Korea, large swaths of China, and other territories all the way through to World War II. And it was an empire prior to that, on a smaller scale, on its own islands, with respect to the various tribal peoples who lived there, whenever a strong national center predominated, historically in Edo. In this way, you can see that, sometimes, the end of an empire is not collapse and dissolution but rather a true cultural unification of the various countries into a single one. The government transforms into something less one-directional (i.e., for the benefit of the center), with the different peoples developing a sense of national identity, and the political center returning some resources out to the provinces, or even giving them more resources than they feed in. This has happened in virtually all countries that became large: Modern-day England itself, for instance, once consisted of many different nations who regarded themselves as separate polities, until eventually a "high king" united them all under the banner of England. That was an act of empire, and for a time "England" was not yet truly a single nation.
Togukawa was an important figure, but Oda Nobunaga and Hideyoshi can´t be neclegted, because they were really the ones behind unifying Japan
I appreciate that you didn’t just say “because WW2 lol”, and did take the effort to summarize the history preceding it. 🙂
Because 🍄☁️🍄☁️ lol
This isn't History Matters.
You appreciate the misinformation that the reason is "history", and NOT "because WW2 lol". Which is the REASON Japan HAS an emperor, even IF it isn't an empire.
Because the constitutionalist VOTE sought to firebomb civilians to stop ITSELF from firebombing MORE CIVILIANS; that's how those politics roll, "because WW2 lol". And Vietnam, and Iraq, AND Afganistan, trololololol.
Your vote matters. Just don't occupy any tall buildings or iPhone factories, or you're gonna feel in your skin what current hegemony does with "non-emperors" of not-called-so EMPIRES. There was no hospital in Pearl Harbor where something like that could be felt, but that's no surprise because there's no room to spread MORE democracy THERE: it was ALREADY almost entirely militarized with state weaponry, the only asset there to be attacked. Now that the European energy has been forcefully funneled more and more through Ukraine where hunter keeps his laptops, THAT became the stage for seizure of such assets. Ones that Russia was not ALLOWED to build elsewhere during "peace" time, much like Ukraine was not ALLOWED into NATO, by NATO. That's some history to appreciate, but be fast, while it still remains unwritten "by the victor".
@@sboinkthelegday3892 Don't care, didn't ask
Cope and seethe
Re: The business analogy - you missed a trick there. A small company's CEO is in charge of ... that small company. They might have a few other CE's in the mix, by and large the company is mostly self-contained as a singular entity. An Emperor is more like the CEO of a conglomerate. The conglomerate has individual divisions, subdivisions, and even entire other companies under the conglomerates control/ownership.
I am Japanese. I've been wondering about it for a long time too.
After the war ended, it became necessary to revise the Constitution of the Empire of Japan.
At that time, I think that "Empire" was omitted because "Japan" was written in the revision draft made by GHQ.
Video Idea: Why did some Empires not call their rulers Emperors/Empresses?
The obvious reason is that Japan isn't really an empire anymore and calling it the "Constitutional Empire of Japan" sounds kinda weird so they just stuck with "Japan"
hold on, are you saying the acronym for Germany's full name is FROG?
I never thought of it, but yes, it kind of is! Ribbit!
It is good video for Japanese people like me.
As an american person, I am glad to hear that. :3
Empreror is equivalent to Shogun, in both the political and the military extent of the title. Tenno is something more like a Caliph (as someone noted in another comment) and not a Pope, and this considering the nature of the functions associated with the title Tenno/Caliph
I never thought of the resemblance between Caliph and Tenno. Then the Ottoman dynasty and its aftermath were a case of what if the Shogun had taken away and merged the title of Tenno with itself. Interesting.
天皇/Tenno means emperor of Heaven,
meanwhile the emperor of China is called 天子/son of Heaven,
so this title seems to be exaggerating and ridiculous for other nations in East Asia,so ancient China, Korea, Vietnam ad other sinic nations just called emperor of Japan as king of Wa/倭王，
Caliph is the supreme leader of all Muslim countries,
Tenno is the king of four main islands,
By the way, I may be wrong, but I do believe that, because they haven't changed it since they were a dominion, Canada does have other words in their official name, being officially named the "Dominion of Canada".
The word emperor in Japanese is 'Tenno' composed of the Kanji for Heaven/Celestial and sovereign/God. So Tenno means 'Heavenly sovereign'.
The term Tenno is translated into English as Emperor but the western conception (inspired by the ancient Roman concept of emperor or 'imperator', imperium and empire) and is different from the east Asian concept.
The term Tenno is inspired by the Chinese term Huangdi (or Kotei in Japanese) which means August/ Divine sovereign.
The terms Tenno and Kotei (Huangdi) are better translated as Thearch (God-Ruler) than emperor. So on a technicality, Japan and China (formerly) are theocracies. The Japanese emperor is believed to have descended from the sun Goddess Amateratsu through her grandson Jinmu. The Chinese emperor was believed to have been appointed by heaven to rule the earth and was called the Son of heaven (Tianzhi in Chinese or Tenshi in Japanese). The Chinese emperors need not claim any grand descent from a god or illustrious ancestor to be considered a legitimate ruler. The Chinese they believed that anyone who ruled well and with benevolence had the blessing of heaven thus a person of humble birth may ascend to the position of emperor if a previous emperor or dynasty became unworthy to rule (either through despotism, negligence or incompetence).
The concept of empire the east Asians have differs from the western conception In the west empires are formed by dominating foreign territories by military conquest, alliance/protectorate treaties, imposing laws, public levies and establishing governing infrastructures to integrate new territories into the general governing sphere of the conquering country.
In the sinosphere the concept of Tianxia or Tenka (Under heaven) is the east Asian equivalent of the western concept of imperialism and empire. But it relies less on conquest (whether militarily or politically) rather it relies on a form of theoretical hegemony of all countries and peoples. The east Asian concept of Tianxia is that of ecumenical (world-spanning) empire that is already established and all countries and people are already a part of it owing fealty to the Tenno/Huangdi.
For example, in imperial China the view would be that all countries even those as far away as Britain or France where part of the Chinese empire despite China having no political involvement in those respective countries governance but because they exist 'under heaven' Tianxia they, by default, are ruled by China and hence the emperor Huangdi. This is because the Chinese believed heaven rules the earth and the emperor was an earthly agent (son of) heaven thus the emperor ruled over all the world.
In the Chinese view, they viewed the world as owing fealty to the emperor. They viewed is the emperor at the centre, surrounding him is his capital city (specifically the imperial court/the imperial government), surrounding that the immediate country the emperor ruled (China), surrounding China are tributary states (established countries and nations with organized governments) and on the outside of this the uncivilised barbarians (specifically nomads with no established country or organized forms of government).
Over all the emperor was said to rule just as heaven looms over the earth and directs it (eg the movements of the heavenly bodies manifested in the solstices and equinoxes which determines the seasons and chronology of earth).
The Byzantine empire is only (now extinct) western country /culture that had a concept similar to Tianxia/Tenka, that is a theoretically ecumenical and hegemonic 'empire'. A belief that the world is ruled by the Christian God and the Byzantine emperor has been delegated to rule the earth on God's behalf and that all countries and nations are (theoretically) part of the Byzantine empire, ruled by the Byzantine emperor and hence ruled by God.
So in all, the english translation of sino-asian word for 'emperor' is inaccurate and the sino-asian concept of empire doesn't translate well into English either.
The better and more accurate terms for Tenno would be Thearch/Theocrat instead of 'emperor' and theocracy/ august country instead of 'empire'.
I thought Canada's official name was the Dominion of Canada. It's very really used but I think some times at the Olympics opening / closing ceremonies Canada is listed under D instead of C.
Name Explain: 1:13 Japan is Japan.
Me: KLAATU IS KLAATU
Japan IS Japan
Actually republic comes from the latin word res publica, meaning public affair or public thing
China had an emperor & was considered the Middle Kingdom by the Chinese. Also it seems that the ruler of China was called the Emperor before Northern China united with South China. Sorta like any king of ancient Egypt was called the pharaoh.
Depends on who held the most legitimate authority and adequate force to complete the cyclical system that is the Mandate of Heaven.
In fairness, most of those titles are just categories that we in modern times have retroactively applied to those groups.
Actually the Chinese use of "Kingdom" is losely used and not translated well in English. Its written form in character 國, actually means more of a realm or country than it does kingdom. Because it's also used for the USA, or 美國。Before recent times, Chinese usually refer to themselves by the ruling dynasty. For example, in the Han dynasty, Chinese would call themselves the Han people or the Han. And now it's associated with the Han Chinese ethnic group. In a way, the concept of the China nation-state is a recent idea.
1:25 I've heard Canada be refered to as "The Dominion of Canada". But this seems to be more of a formality rather than any sort of official name.
It's more of an old official name in my understanding. Canada was a dominion of the British empire until fairly recently, which meant it didn't have legal independence even if it largely had home rule. So calling Canada "The Dominion of Canada" now would be innaccurate rather than formal
Spain was an Empire without an emperor.
Japan has an emperor without an Empire.
The British Empire is also a commonly used term, despite Britain not having an emperor either
1:26 I don't know about the others, but Canada and New Zealand both have official titles. The Dominion of Canada and Dominion of New Zealand respectively.
"Dominion" was a colonial name when Canada was still a colony. The term stopped being used in 1951.
Like for "Republic of Ireland", these titles aren't official
@@Liggliluff It is still official
@@Tugela60 It never stopped being used officially
As a Canadian I was pretty sure we were just Canada, but I had doubts and was just trying to double check on my phone when you answered my curiosity lol
And that is strange indeed, as the expectation would be either Kingdom of Canada or Commonwealth of Canada!
But I believe the shift to "just" Canada didn't happen until rather recently, IIRC, I think I remember something to that avail, but I might also be wrong.
Greetings from the Federal Republic of Germany!
@@lucemiserlohn We used to be called the Dominion of Canada, but kinda just... stopped using that in the 50s. Technically speaking it's very unclear whether or not we were EVER the "Dominion of Canada" since our copy of the law has that exact phrase zero times, but dominion was SPECIFICALLY used as it was a compromise between the monarchists (who wanted us to be the Kingdom of Canada) and those afraid of offending the stauncher anti-monarchists in the USA.
@@AgaresOaks The United States Dept. of State told Canada that there were to be no kingdoms in the Americas.
@@Pisti846 which makes no sense since legally speaking Canada is a kingdom
@@AgaresOaks That is very true. When Canada became legally completely independent from the United Kingdom in 1982 there was talk leading up to the new constitution that some in the Canadian government wanted to name the country Kingdom of Canada. The US State Department out pressure on the Canadian government not to do so. The US said there will be no kingdoms in the Western Hemisphere. Thus, when the Queen of Canada signed your new constitution into law you became forever more just Canada.
I guess it is some unique English trait to call it some other name.
In Polish it is the Japan's Empire (Cesarstwo Japonii).
Great video! Just one correction: 10:28 Taiwan was already part of the Japanese Empire since 1905 when they took it from the Qing Empire (China).
It was an empire, but people didn't like it
Well Japan is like the UK, the Royal Family is nowadays just a symbol and some elected politician actually runs the country.
Similar to my country, used to be called as 'Federation of Malaysia' but after the exit of Singapore, it literally just known as 'Malaysia'.
Japan itself calls its Foundion day as
"Empire Day" (Kigensetsu) (紀元節)
or National Foundation Day
which celebrated every February 11 with Emperor Jimmu from 660 BCE
日本は今も帝国であります
thank you
Emperor sounds better than Prefecturor
Better an imperator than, may Sol forgive me for uttering this kind, a praetor
In retrospect, there's never British emperors but why's there a British Empire? Chinese empire, many Chinese dynasties ruled by emperor Shihuangdi of Qin dynasty, Emperor Wudi of Han dynasty, Emperor Emperor Gaozong of Tang dynasty, Emperor Kangxi of Ching dynasty. Vietnam's Emperor Ly Loi of Ly dynasty, Emperor Bao Dai of Nguyen dynasty.
Definitely needs a lot more historical nuance. The reason why 帝国 is used for Japan back in the day is complicated, but a lot of the reason is because the neighboring 帝国 did not bother actually competing the title. Empires are essentially the most reasonable top-level entity of governance which almost always insists on a bureaucratic core rather than mere inheritance and devolved feudal/tribal powers. Japan being called an empire is an attempt to bridge the concept while adapting to what Japan self-identified as. In the case of Japan, it was so far removed from everything else that it only had one single entity it needed to resist to call itself an empire, and China never cared enough to strip the title away (they cared when it came to Korea, Ryukyu, and Vietnam). So nominally they've been an empire, just that they became a _colonial_ empire after the Meiji restoration. Colonial empires are their own thing.
China called itself an empire but it had to contest that title with other empires nearby, most notably the Mongols and Tibetans. This stopped happening after nationalism started to take over, which is basically the imperfect, often misunderstood Asiatic adaptation to a purely European concept. The consequence is that these Asian polities stopped calling themselves empires as part of this movement, China included. Japan, wanting to be a colonial empire, sought after the title, and after being defeated the US wanted to remove its ability to be a colonial empire. But never has Japan been a true empire in the classical sense, as it never had to contest that title earnestly (it is really only meaningful in continental Eurasia where there are too many polities). So for all intents and purposes, the emperor of Japan was basically a hereditary king who is more or less a Shinto pope today (a religion that was also wildly transformed by reforms into State Shinto).
It's technically a theocracy because in Shintō the emperor is descendant of the gods though it's a democratic theocracy because of the presence of a prime minister
Japan being a theocracy would imply that the emperor still holds a fairly significant degree of political power. He doesn't... anymore. It's a parliamentary democracy under a constitutional monarchy
I don't know, I see it more as a parallel to the European kings claiming a divine right to rule, than like the Pope
@@REDnBLACKnRED but the emperor is also the head of the Shintō religion
@@velazquezarmouries you could technically claim that since Elizabeth II is the Head of the Church of England, that would be the same situation. obviously they (the Queen and the emperor) occupy much different positions in their respective religions, but technically if you can describe Japan as a theocracy then so is the UK and Norway for example
Yes. A limited theocracy. This problem stems from attempting to translate Tenno. We don't translate Pope, Caliph or Dalai Lama because we acknowledge that these positions do not have Western equivalents.
So, Japan is not an empire because it doesn't have an emperor.
They’re still in the naughty corner. THEY KNOW WHAT THEY DID
Another definition of empire is a polity that has several other polities within it that have different cultures and ethnicities. So, postwar Japan isn't an Empire because the country is largely ethnically homogeneous thus that title being useless. The colonial powers and Rome were empires through and through with that definition.
Originally, Empire was the word for the unrestricted power of roman generals and consuls
So Switzerland is an Empire?
@@zyanego3170 no it isn't
@@deutschermichel5807 according to the Definition above it would be.
@@zyanego3170 that's why the definition is false
What's the difference between Imperator and Imperare?
Bit of a blunder at 10:35. Taiwan was not colonized in WW2, it was under control of Japan since 1890s and was more integrated than Korea
The word Emperor comes from the Latin for “commander and chief.” So the US could be called an empire with an elected emperor.
America is most definitely a military empire
A small thing I noticed about the speech pattern in this video is how it extends the final syllable of a senteeeence. Best example from 6:10 when two sentences ends with "Japaaaan".
While Imperare farthest origin of the word "Emperor", Emperor actually stems from a application of the latin word "Imperator"(commander/he who commands). Julius Ceasar was for example hailed as an Imperator (and the names became linked to one another, see usage lf emperor in german Caesar > "Kaiser" or imperator > emperor in English
The dream of a world under one roof ,a world under the one sun ,never became a reality
The full name of Japan is the empire of Japan I don’t know where this guy gets his information from but Japan has had many empires.
Only commenting this because some started the 'Ireland official name is...' debate.
I like to point that Ireland had an Emperor at one point, I believe it was some time after 1002 until 1014.
And yes the most famous High king of Ireland was the only Emperor of the Irish.
Interestingly Brian Ború never had the title of High king, his titles were King of Munster, Master of Ireland, Emperor of the Irish
The Constitution of the Empire of Japan existed from 1889 to 1947. So in 1947 the name of the empire was officially abolished.
Actually there was a central power in Japan. This is why the Emperor had so much influence even when his power was reduced.
The title "天皇＝ten-nou"is not strictly an emperor
It has the meaning of "the son of heaven", which means the one who has been given the rulership of the earth from heaven, and it is a name to oppose the powerful ancient Chinese emperor who ruled the surrounding countries.
It is a name used in letters sent to China to express that ``the Japanese monarch has an equal relationship that does not yield to China (then Tang).''
The name is still used today
※"the son of heaven"
In the English translation, it is described as heaven, but heaven is Takamagahara that appears in ancient Japanese mythology.
There is no equivalent English translation
It is slightly different from heaven in Christianity etc.
And then there was the Holy Roman Empire, which was not Roman, not holy and not [really] an empire. More to the point for British empire enthusiasts, there was Empress Maud [Matilda], who was supposed to become Queen of England, but most of the nobles broke their oaths, revolted and caused an English civil war. Princess Matilda was therefore queen/not queen, empress not empress and mother of a British Norman/French.Angevin King.
Canada is still technically the Dominion of Canada (it was never legally changed), but the title hasn't been used in any capacity since World War II.
I also find it interesting there are British and American empires yet these empires have never had emprerors.
History Matters noted that Queen Victoria was empress of India, so that the kings there could still keep their titles.
@@andrewjgrimm it was more because all the other cool kids (France, Germany, Austria, the Ottomans) had Emperors, but England's unique political history was anathema to giving the monarch more power or authority (Magna Carta and all that). The English were okay with an Empress of India because their mindset was "you cant be OUR emperor, but you can be THEIR emperor."
America had an emperor, actually (Emperor Norton)
@@andrewjgrimm her successors until WW2 were Emperors of India as well
I think a nation that has an emperor/kaiser or king is an empire but nations like say the US or Russia would be an imperial force.
So Disney is not the magic kingdom but the magic empire.
10:24 Taiwan was ceded to Japan in 1895 a long time before WWII
Tbf Belize, Canada, Jamaica, and New Zealand all have a Queen.
Historically, Tennō have existed for 1400 years, and at that time, Japan had several ethnic groups in disarray: Yamato, Kumaso, Hayato, Emishi...
In that sense, Tennō was an emperor at that time.
Probably has something to do with getting rekt by USA, best country in the world
USA USA USA USA USA USA USA USA
Wow i just found out that being an "emperor demigod master rece " is useless against 1 fat man and 1 little boy .
Keep in mind thats just in English. Not Japanese, pretty sure Koku means Empire in Nippon/anipponkoku.
“Koku” 国 means “country.” It is used in the Japanese names for other countries such as Kankoku 韓国 for Korea, Chuugoku 中国 for China, and Beikoku 米国 for the U.S., as well as internal regional names, such as Shikoku 四国. “Empire” is “teikoku” 帝国. You can see it used in the names of some old establishments such as the Teikoku Hotel / Imperial Hotel in Hibiya, Tokyo.
Well, the kanji on the exit stamp they place on the passport says "The State of Japan" rather than just "Japan"
And country without a long official name I end up calling, "State of X" so in this case, I'd refer to Japan, as: "State of Japan". Except this doesn't work as well for Federal States, Like Canada, which I would call the "Federation of Canada," as Canada really has 10 States, It's 10 Provinces, and isn't a single State like Japan, Hungary, or New Zealand are.
Even after WW2, Japan called themselves Empire of Japan for a while. That was until the Allies GHQ commanded Japanese government to stop calling themselves Empire at May 1947.
You make it seem like the concept of a Shogunate existed after and during Tokugawas reign, which is long. Its existing goes far back.
1:23 isn't Canada "the dominion of Canada"?
Not anymore if I remember correctly.
Japan: I want be Empire with Emperor!
USA: nope
Japan: Can I keep at least Emperor?
USA: ... ok
I always understood that the Emperor of Japan was an Emperor, simply because the Emperor of China was an Emperor. Thus when the English/Latin word was introduced to Japan there was no way the Japanese would accept a title that would put their ruler lesser than the Chinese Emperor.
Happy birthday 🎁🎊🎂🎉🎈
Thailand was never conquered, they signed a cease fire and then started a war with Myanmar
Quick answer: ww2
And enpire doesn’t mean loads of land it means a strong country that is as strong as an empire they can be small or big the country with strong military or political connections.
I was like HMMMM as soon as I saw this video title. What went straight to my head was the Japanese Empire lmao
The same reason why Germany is not a reich.
Also, maybe the Japanese emperor should have been translated as pope.
king of Japan, it is enough,
In your dreams
"Why Is Japan Not Called An Empire?"
Napoleon: WHY indeed.
because before 1895, Japan only had 4 main islands, it is ridiculous to call Japan as empire, when she had just the size of a province of her neighbor,
This channel is ridiculously Anglocentric lol
It is simply called... Jepaaaaahhnnn
To be honest, I will change his name to king. It is large if you compare with eu countries but it is really small in Asia.
The Allies decided to leave Hirohito alone since even laying a finger on him will most likely anger the populace and spark some sort of revolt, which the Allies would obviously NOT want to happen
Japan wasn't called an empire when it was ruled by the Shogun, even though the Imperial Household has existed for at least 1500 years. The Japanese Emperor is more accurately the high priest of Shinto.
Japan is Empire. Japan exist since 660 BC.
Japan was only an empire from 1895 to 1945
the rest of time just a kingdom with 4 main islands,
This video is so bizarrely focused... like for example it ignores that Japan was forced to give up sakoku by western aggression which changes the context. There's just a lot of things like that in this video. The Meiji restoration did give power to the imperial family but by WW2 the emperor was more of a figurehead and for some reason that is left out entirely. Even in the beginning Nobunaga isn't mentioned once despite the fact he unified 90% of Japan and is seen as the unifier.
I don't know, it feels like someone took everything from wikipedia but had no background knowledge to apply context to it... and like even the pronunciation of Hirohito, you would think this person has never heard of Japan outside wikipedia.
Why have you suddenly started speaking like that? Drawling the final sylable of each sentence? really stramge and distracting. :/
Very tiring to listen to indeed
Well they DID have an empire at one point. But then the war crimes happened and we are NOT letting them even think about going through that again. No way, no how.
Want it an empire even before conquering Hokkaido? I remember Japan being called an empire when it was just the main island and the islands to the south.
It is a bit pointless to think too much about the western concept of emperor or empire.
After all, a tennou was already called "emperor" before Japan became an empire.
Japan once had many lands which can be called "empire" but it's rather accidental.
Originally, it is nothing to do with the western "imperator".
The title 天皇(tennou) was originally started to use claiming the equivalence or independence to the Chinese emperor 皇帝(koutei) and Chinese empire in the ancient diplomacy, ( otherwise a king (王) is a subject to the Chinese emperor ). The kanji words 天皇 and 皇帝 have the same origin and hence almost the same meaning like "king of king", Japan just made up slightly different terminology than 皇帝, not to provoke unnecessary tension. Later, the Chinese emperor was translated as emperor, and then the same rule applied to tennou. That's it.
I could have sworn Canada was officially The Dominion of Canada 🇨🇦
I just realized that “Tokyo” is just “Kyoto” spelled sybillically backwards!
Soundwise, yes, but with Kanji, Tokyo (東京/とうきょう) and Kyoto (京都/きょうと) have totally different meanings. The former is "City of East/Eastern City", and the latter is "the City." You cannot tell that "TO" in both names are not the same by just looking at those words written in alphabet. (Actually the sounds are different, too. One is the long "To" and the other short.)
how can a country be qualified as empire when it only has 4 main islands?
9:39: as if Russia wasn't big enough already.
Little Brother complex looking at Big Bro China. China as the central power for millennia in East Asia recognized kings (王) in surrounding nations. Japan thought it was too good for such an arrangement and used the term 天皇, similar to the term used in China for emperor 皇帝.
So in the early days the Japanese Emperor was like the Merovingian Kings of France.
"Japan" is called 日本 (Nihon, origin of the sun) by actual Japanese (Nihonjin).
The Japanese "Emperor" isn't an emperor; that's a Western invention. The proper term is Tennō, which roughly means "Heavenly Sovereign."
The title is like him trying to deny that WW2 even exists. I mean, they did so some shenanigans in China, but like totally did nothing, saids Japan.
They secretly do the worst atrocity
[Rape of Nanking]
Did = Did-e
Asia = Asiaarr
Within = Wivin
All = All-er
Ruler = Wuler
Them = Dem-er
Thing = Fingge
One would think pronunciation would be important to a channel all about names.
Manwhile poles calling it Japanese Empire even in official documents: