World Events in 1470 - In Japan
From 1467 to 1477, Japan was in a complete state of crisis: this was the well-know War of Onin, the war between the great feudal clans. In 1470, the war was at its height. Ransacked and pillaged, ravaged by famines and epidemics, Japan no longer knew in which gods to believe. This notwithstanding, in 1470, a certain Ashikaga Yoshimasa built the most elegant, the most sophisticated, the most Japanese of monuments in history: the Silver Pavilion in Kyoto, the Ginkaku-ji. It is rather extraordinary to realize that Botticelli's Fortitude is a contemporary of the Silver Pavilion in Kyoto and many other works which were created in the circumstances which we have just covered.
