Taira no Kiyomori had in 1180 ordered the execution of the exiled Minamoto no Yoritomo, whom he had spared in 1160 after killing his father and most of his kinsmen at court following the Taira victory in the Heiji War.

Yoritomo, on receiving this news, had raised the white standard of the Minamoto clan and taken to the field in Kanto, where the Taira military forces had nearly annihilated his small army.

Yoritomo’s depleted ranks are soon replenished, however, with men chafing under the harsh rule of the Taira, and drive the Taira out of Kanto by 1182.