Born the daughter of Hino Shigemasa, of a noble family long tied to the shogunal house by marriage.
She married the 8th shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa.
Her first child died on the day of its birth. Rumor blamed a curse by Imamairi no Tsubone, a woman close to Yoshimasa, who was exiled.
She bore a son, Yoshihisa. Yoshimasa had named his brother Yoshimi heir the year before, so her wish to make her own son shogun became a seed of conflict.
The succession quarrel combined with the great governors' feuds to ignite the Ōnin War. Tomiko is said to have turned to Yamana Sōzen (debated). Kyoto was reduced to ashes.
Yoshihisa became the 9th shogun, and Tomiko came to wield great political power on behalf of the boy.
Amid the war she amassed a fortune by lending to lords and trading rice. She set up toll barriers at Kyoto's entrances, angering the people. She is also said to have paid lords to bring the war to an end.
People enraged by the Kyoto tolls rose up and destroyed the barriers. Tomiko was called a wicked woman, yet she truly did sustain the shogunate's strained finances.
Shogun Yoshihisa died young while campaigning in Ōmi, and her husband Yoshimasa died the next year. Tomiko then backed Yoshiki, Yoshimi's son, as the next shogun.
The kanrei Hosokawa Masamoto ousted shogun Yoshiki and installed another (Meiō Coup), reportedly with Tomiko's consent. The shogunate had grown so weak that a vassal could replace the shogun.
She died in Kyoto. Having lost husband and son, she had sustained the shogunate through troubled times with her wealth.
Yamana SōzenIchijō KaneyoshiAshikaga YoshimasaHosokawa MasamotoAshikaga Yoshimi
Asakura Takakage (Toshikage)Hosokawa KatsumotoŌta DōkanAshikaga YoshimasaAshikaga YoshimiHatakeyama MasanagaHosokawa MasamotoŌuchi Yoshioki
People of the Muromachi period ・ People by period
Based on facts found in textbooks and biographies. Uncertain points are marked as such.