Monogatari Historiography
The Japanese have developed a number of complementary strategies for capturing, preserving and disseminating the essential elements of their commonly-accepted national history – chronicles of sovereigns and events, biographies of eminent persons and personalities, and the military tale or gunki monogatari. This last form evolved from an interest in recording the activities of military conflicts in the late 12th century. The major battles, the small skirmishes and the individual contests (and the military figures who animate these accounts) have all been passed from generation to generation in the narrative formats of the Tale of Hōgen (1156) the Tale of Heiji (1159-1160) and the Heike monogatari (1180-1185).
In each of these familiar monogatari, the central figures are popularly well known, the major events are generally understood, and the stakes as they were understood at the time are conventionally accepted as elements in the foundation of Japanese culture. The accuracy of each of these historical records has become a compelling subject for further study; and some accounts have been shown to withstand close scrutiny, while other presumed "facts" have turned out to be inaccurate.
The most prevalent and well known edition of the Tale of the Heike today, the 1371 Kakuichi text, is generally thought to be a fictional dramaticization of the Genpei War. Rather than focusing on the Genpei warriors as they actually were, but rather upon the "...ideal warrior as conceived by oral singers…” it serves as an account of glorified conduct as a source of inspiration.
Read more about this topic: The Tale Of The Heike