Prince Asahiko was born in Kyoto, the fourth son of Prince Fushimi Kuniye, the twentieth head of the Fushimi-no-miya, the oldest of the four branches of the imperial dynasty allowed to provide a successor to the Chrysanthemum throne should the main imperial house fail to produce an heir.

In 1852, Emperor Kōmei transferred him to Shōren-in, a major monzeki temple of the Tendai sect in Kyoto and he assumed the title Shōren no miya Son'yu.

His popularity among the Ishin Shishi (the pro-imperial court nationalist patriots) attracted the attention of Ii Naosuke, daimyō of Hikone[1] and the Tairō during the final illness of Shōgun Tokugawa Iesada.

When Ii launched the Ansei Purge, the prince was condemned to perpetual confinement at Shōkoku-ji and spent more than two years living in a tiny, dilapidated hut.

This was part of the amnesty declared in honor of the marriage of Shōgun Tokugawa Iemochi, to Kazu-no-miya, the Emperor Kōmei's half-sister.

Emperor Meiji pardoned him in February 1872, restoring his princely status and allowing him to start a new collateral branch of the imperial dynasty, the Kuni-no-miya.