What would happen if the son of a powerful daimyo raped and was responsible for the suicide of the daughter of another powerful daimyo in Sengoku Japan?

by spiralsandjeremy

I'd like to get someone who has knowledge on the social history of Sengoku Japan to shed some light on these topics for me.

As I understand it, the Sengoku era was a period of upheaval in Japan, where there was no central authority, and society was organized along feudal lines, or to describe it less anachronistically, personal ties were the glue that bound people together, rather than loyalty towards something more abstract. Again, correct me if I'm wrong because I'm not an expert.

Now, in a situation like this, how was crime and punishment dealt with? I'm assuming that most judgments involving those with relatively little power would be made by local authorities. But what if a member of one powerful family committed a crime against another powerful family?

Imagine, for the sake of argument, that the daughter of a powerful daimyo was raped brutally by the son of another powerful daimyo, and she was so traumatized that she committed suicide, and left a note accusing her attacker of being responsible for her death. Pure fiction, but it seems plausible in virtually any era.

How would the father of this girl go about seeking redress? Was rape even considered a crime? And since the girl is dead and can't elaborate on her story, is there even enough evidence to move forward with some kind of legal proceeding? If the attacker was convicted, what punishment would he face? And finally, if the powerful family of the victim could not receive satisfaction through legal means, would this mean a feud between the two clans, perhaps duels, or maybe even war?

ParallelPain

TL;DR: The situation exactly as you described probably did not happen. If they were at war and the princess was captured, no one really cares. If they both live at the same castle, it would depend on the lord of the realm, whoever he may be.

This is not my area of expertise unfortunately. If anyone have a better answer I gladly welcome it.

But I am trying to think of a situation where this would realistically happen and...couldn't.

A daimyō would presumably be living in his castle with his family, full of retainers, soldiers, and guards. One daimyō's son won't have access to another daimyō's daughter who's castle was likely deep in a mountain somewhere far away.

There are two exceptions to this I can think of. One is that the two daimyos were already at war, and one was defeated and the princess captured and raped. In this case unless the defeated daimyō could somehow raise another army and defeat his rival to revenge his daughter, I don't think many people would care much. It's quite likely for the defeated daimyō to be dead already if it came to this, although the situation could be complicated. For instance, according to the 勝山記 (katsuyamaki) Oyamada Nobuari-a Takeda vassal-took the wife of Kasahara Kiyoshige-who had just been killed by Takeda troops and castle taken-as his concubine (and the survivors of the castle were sold into slavery). So that's pretty straight forward. Takeda Harunobu (Shingen) on the other hand, took as concubine the daughter of his ex-ally Suwa Yorishige, whom he had just defeated and forced to commit seppuku. According to 甲陽軍鑑 (kōyō gunkan) at least, there was a degree of politics in this decision, to have a son born of the daughter of Suwa Yorishige to succeed the Suwa family with Takeda blood and tie. Through this Takeda would gain firm control of the Suwa clan and all of its followers. I can't see the Suwa princess being very happy about this whatever the reason though, since Takeda Harunobu did just conquer her clan, kill her dad, and send her brother into exile. Not to mention, you know, forcing her to be a concubine. The good news for her is that after her death her son got to succeed the Takeda clan. The bad news is he got destroyed by Oda Nobunaga.

The other exception is that if one or both daimyōs were vassals of a bigger daimyō, and lived in the same castle with their family as either owner or hostage. In this case, the head daimyō and owner of the castle and lord of the realm, whether he be the father of the rapist or the princess or the lord of both of their families, would make the decision. In this case there is a central authority powerful enough to legally decide the case. I unfortunately do not know of any cases of what you describe, though I personally believe it probably happened, but not at the daimyō family level, but when one or both sides are much smaller retainers.

I can't really tell you what that decision would be, as none of the few law codes I've read or read about have specific codes about rape. It's be a question if the case fall under killing (in Takeda realm, death sentence if the killer's 12 or over), or if the lord would just decide a solution despite lack of concrete legislation, which I can't tell you. However I can tell you that in this case, assuming both families are vassal, neither would, if they were still rational, try to sort it out among themselves through force. The usual law is that if a fight starts, assuming the one attacked fought back, both sides are to be punished, often by death.

I also say with some confidence that if a vassal's son had the guts to rape the lord's daughter and cause her death, especially a lord who's powerful enough to demand his vassals live in his castle, the rapist is probably looking at a very ugly end. I would not be surprised if his own father pushed for execution to try to prevent the case from negatively impacting the family, or limit however possible the punishment on the clan. So this is one scenario that must be rare indeed, if it happened at all. I can also see, if the rapist was of the lord's family, that this might become a reason to rebel or switch side at the next opportunity, but alas I know of no recorded examples.