een matched to this day.Great elegance and refinement marked life in Japan and Europe's capitals. In Europe and Japan great castles were built marking the capital of each separate country. The royal families promoted the arts, medicine, and science. One of the most memorable of European castles lies just outside of Paris, France. The Palace of Versailles built by King Louis XIV in the seventeenth century. In Japan however, the funerals of the emperors and empresses was more memorable. Kofun Mounds were mounds of earth piled over their ruler's graves. The largest keyhole tomb measured 486m in length, 305m in width, and 33.6m in height. It was provided for Emperor Nintoku. One of the major differences between Europe and Japan was colonization:As individual European countries scrambled to gain more territory to add to their Empires, Japan feared the changes that visiting countries brought. When other countries visited Japan with imports to trade they also brought with them a new religion, Christianity. Japanese Emperors feared the chaos that a new religion would bring and decided to shut the rest of the world out. Only the Dutch were allowed to trade with the Japanese as a need remained to be informed of the rest of the world and medical advances.ECONOMICS: In both Europe and Japan all taxes went to the central government:In Europe the nobility were responsible for collecting taxes from their serfs and giving them to the central government. In return for the efforts of the nobility, they received property and significant tax breaks. In both Japan and Europe the tax burden was always on the poor. As a result of such high taxes the poor remained poor generation after generation. In France during the seventeenth century King Louis XIV put taxes on everything including bread. At that point the serfs could no longer afford to eat, and were fed up with the feudal system. Thus, the French Revolution began. In Japan similar experiences occurred, h...
