Takagari In Japan , records indicate that falconry began in the fourth century . According to a passage in the " Nihon Shoki " ( 720 ) , falconry was introduced by the Baekje noble Sakenokimi in 359 during the reign of Emperor Nintoku . From the outset , the central Court and local lords both enjoyed hawking , with the former trying to monopolize falconry , sometimes with banning orders . Central power , however , as seen in the repetition of prohibiting orders , had no complete control over local falconry until the 17th century . In the 13th century , hawking became popular among the rising samurai class as well as among court nobles ( " kuge " ) . At that time , the practice of hawking was a means of resolving struggles over land ownership among lords . Buddhist temples , who were also land owners , opposed falconry based on their ideology against killing . Falconer lords , on the other hand , devised a Buddhist rationale or resorted to Shinto justifications . Several falconry schools or styles ( " ryū " ) were formed in the process . The falconry methods employed in Japan had originally been Sino - Korean ones . Based on Chinese texts and practice , " Shinshū Yōkyō " was edited in 818 as a falconry textbook . From the 13th century on , nobles left falconry texts as evidence of their authority in falconry . The establishment of the Ashikaga shogunate in Kyoto allowed mutual influence between " kuge " and samurai on the development of the sport . Samurai falconers also began to write falconry texts in the 16th century . The sport had always been a status symbol , as a very expensive pastime , involving not only the rarity and cost of the haggards , passages and eyass es , and the costs of housing , raising , and training them , but it also required access to a large amount of space , and a lot of time and effort , things presumably denied to all but the most fortunate of the common classes . With the opening of the Tokugawa period , the wars of the Sengoku period came to an end , and falconry became one of the primary outlets for the militaristic energies of the samurai class , along with archery , swordplay , and horse racing . Tokugawa Ieyasu enjoyed falconry very much himself , and used it as a symbol of his authority , and of his plans for the country , transforming the violence of his conquest into a peacetime system of laws . He banned traditional falconry by " kuge " , who had been holders of the art since the first introduction of falconry . He established restrictions on which ranks of creatures a samurai or " daimyo " ( feudal lord ) could hunt , from geese and ducks up to the more valuable swans . He also set up certain lands as " takaba " ( 鷹場 ) , or falconry fields ; practicing the sport on all other lands was forbidden . Many of these designated lands were farmers ' lands ; the peasant farmers were forced to provide labor for the hunt , which often took days or even weeks , and were forbidden from interfering with the prey creatures of their lands , despite the damage geese and other animals might do to crops . Goshawk s , and other birds of prey , increasingly became symbols of status , and in the early Edo period , many paintings were commissioned by samurai . While the first images of hawk s and eagles in Japan appeared in the 13th century , since the 14th and 15th centuries , paintings with hawks as the main subject appeared , under the influence of imported Chinese paintings . As the visibility and popularity of falconry grew , at the beginning of the Edo period , images of the hunt , of mews , of wild birds of prey , and even portraits of favored individual birds were increasingly commissioned . While common people were kept out of falconry , their interest in it gave rise to some ukiyo - e art by Hokusai , Hiroshige and Kawanabe Kyosai . Falconry flourished throughout the Edo period , with only a short interruption imposed by Tokugawa Tsunayoshi . With the Meiji Revolution , the monopoly on falconry by samurai ended . Falconry was released to the public , but in the process of modernization , its prosperity faded . While the Imperial Household Ministry gathered ex - falconers and tried to keep their tradition , some methods were lost , and others were handed down to private enthusiasts . Hawk - eagle austringers in northeastern Japan have also emerged in the process , although their origin is somewhat uncertain . After World War II , the Imperial Household Agency suspended the practice of hawking , and the tradition of " takagari " is today kept by clubs formed by enthusiasts .