[1] He entered Kofuku-ji temple as monk, but when his older brother Yoshiteru was killed by the Miyoshi clan, he returned to secular life and took the name "Yoshiaki".

[6][7] There was no effective central authority in Kyoto until Ashikaga Yoshiaki was able to enlist warlord Oda Nobunaga to support his cause.

The Oda armies entered Kyoto in 1568, re-establishing the Muromachi shogunate under Ashikaga Yoshiaki as a puppet shōgun.

Despite a renewed central authority in Kyoto and Nobunaga's attempt to unify the country, the struggle for power among warring states continued.

[13] In 1576, he sought the support of the Mōri clan, the largest daimyō in Western Japan, and moved his base to Tomo (present-day Fukuyama City).

According to historian Mary Elizabeth Berry, Yoshiaki still resisted Nobunaga's de facto successor Toyotomi Hideyoshi by 1590.