Who they were
Exiled to Izu as a boy after his father’s defeat in the Heiji Rebellion (1160), he was spared by Taira no Kiyomori. He proved ruthless with rivals and masterly with institutions.
What they did
He raised the eastern warriors in 1180 and governed from Kamakura while his brother Yoshitsune won the Genpei War’s battles. In 1185 he secured the right to appoint military governors and estate stewards (shugo and jito). He then hunted down Yoshitsune, destroyed the Northern Fujiwara of Hiraizumi (1189), and was appointed Seii Taishogun in 1192. He died in 1199 — tradition says after a fall from his horse.
Legacy
The shogunate he founded endured as a form of rule, in three incarnations, until 1868.