samurai's death. If a samurai failed to keep his promise of bushido he could regain it by committing seppuku (a ritual suicide). There are seven virtues of Bushido, Gi-Rectitude, Yu-Courage, Jin- Benevolence, Rei-Respect, Makoto- Honesty, Meiyo-Honor and Chugi- Loyalty. Miyamoto Musashi and Yamamoto Tsunetomo are two very important figures in the development of Bushido. Bushido was also the spiritual influence for those who committed the kamikaze attacks in World War II. For this reason, many of the martial arts that had been linked back to bushido were banned by Americans during the post-war.
             The Meiji restoration refers to the events of 1868 that led to the restoration of power to the emperor and an entire period of revolutionary changes. Debt and internal division had weakened the power of the Tokugawa shogunate. The Choshu and Satsuma of Western Japan tried to defeat foreigners on their own but despite their powers, the were defeated. In the January of 1868 samurai from these cities with anti-Tokugawa court nobles succeeded in a palace coup that abolished the shogunate and returned the power to the emperor. The court was moved from Kyoto to Tokyo where a centralized government was established
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