Yoshiteru Ashikaga was the 13th Shogun, he ruled during the late Muromachi period.
Background
Yoshiteru Ashikaga was born on 31 March 1536. He was the eldest son of the twelfth shogun of the Muromachi shogunate, Ashikaga Yoshiharu, but though his father held the title of shogun, it carried with it little actual power, since the period was one of almost incessant strife and civil war, and both father and son were obliged to flee from Kyoto and take refuge in the province of Omi.
Career
In 1546 Yoshiteru became the thirteenth shogun and returned to the capital, attempting to exercise power with Hosokawa Harumoto to assist him in the position of kanrei (chief administrator), but a struggle broke out between Hosokawa Harumoto and his vassal Miyoshi Nagaharu, and the shogun was once more obliged to flee to Omi. Miyoshi Nagaharu having emerged the victor in his struggle with Hosokawa Harumoto, he invited Shogun Yoshiteru to return to the capital.
As Miyoshi Nagaharu grew older, however, his power passed into the hands of his vassal Matsunaga Hisahide. When Nagaharu died in 1564, Yoshiteru attempted to sieze power from Matsunaga Hisahide, but in the fifth month of the following year he was attacked by Hisahide’s forces and obliged to commit suicide. This process, in which a vassal overthrows his lord only to be overthrown in turn by his own vassal, is known in Japanese as gekokujo and is characteristic of this period, an age of warfare and social upheavel when actual ability counted far more than birth or position.