was a

Japanese castle are fortresses constructed primarily of wood and stone. They evolved from the wooden stockades of earlier centuries and came into their best-known form in the 16th century. Castles in Japan were built to guard important or strategic sites, such a ...

located in Karatsu,

Saga Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyushu. Saga Prefecture has a population of roughly 780,000 and has a geographic area of . Saga Prefecture borders Fukuoka Prefecture to the northeast and Nagasaki Prefect ...

. Nagoya Castle was located within

Hizen Province was an old provinces of Japan, old province of Japan in the area of the Saga Prefecture, Saga and Nagasaki Prefecture, Nagasaki prefectures. It was sometimes called , with Higo Province. Hizen bordered on the provinces of Chikuzen Province, Ch ...

on a

peninsula A peninsula is a landform that extends from a mainland and is only connected to land on one side. Peninsulas exist on each continent. The largest peninsula in the world is the Arabian Peninsula. Etymology The word ''peninsula'' derives , . T ...

near to

Iki Island , or the , is an archipelago in the Tsushima Strait, which is administered as the city of Iki in Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan. The islands have a total area of with a total population of 28,008. Only four (4) of the twenty-three (23) named is ...

, and served as the base from which

Toyotomi Hideyoshi , otherwise known as and , was a Japanese samurai and ''daimyō'' (feudal lord) of the late Sengoku period, Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods and regarded as the second "Great Unifier" of Japan.Richard Holmes, The World Atlas of Warfare: ...

launched his

invasions of Korea An invasion is a military offensive of combatants of one geopolitical entity, usually in large numbers, entering territory controlled by another similar entity, often involving acts of aggression. Generally, invasions have objectives of c ...

from 1592 to 1598. None of the original historic structures of Nagoya Castle remain, but the castle's ruined foundations survive in the formerly separate town of

Chinzei The branch, also called the Chinzei Doctrine (鎮西義), is one of the two largest branches of Jōdo-shū Buddhism (the second being Seizan). The tradition traces itself to Benchō (a.k.a. Shōkō Shōnin), a disciple of Hōnen, but it was f ...

, now part of the city of Karatsu. It is said that during the brief time that Hideyoshi stayed at Nagoya Castle, he memorized the ''shite'' (lead role) parts for ten

Noh is a major form of classical Japanese dance-drama that has been performed since the 14th century. It is Japan's oldest major theater art that is still regularly performed today. Noh is often based on tales from traditional literature featuri ...

plays and performed them, forcing various ''

daimyō were powerful Japanese magnates, feudal lords who, from the 10th century to the early Meiji era, Meiji period in the middle 19th century, ruled most of Japan from their vast hereditary land holdings. They were subordinate to the shogun and no ...

'' to accompany him onstage as the ''waki'' (accompanying role), and even performed before the

Emperor The word ''emperor'' (from , via ) can mean the male ruler of an empire. ''Empress'', the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife (empress consort), mother/grandmother (empress dowager/grand empress dowager), or a woman who rules ...

. A museum dedicated to the history of Japanese-Korean relations and related subjects is associated with Nagoya Castle and located nearb

History

Nagoya Castle was located on a hill about 90 meters high on the Higashi-Matsuura Peninsula. During the early

Sengoku period The was the period in History of Japan, Japanese history in which civil wars and social upheavals took place almost continuously in the 15th and 16th centuries. The Kyōtoku incident (1454), Ōnin War (1467), or (1493) are generally chosen as th ...

(1467–1615), this was a strong-point of the Matsuura clan. According to clan history compiled in centuries later in the

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

), the Matsuura was a clan allied with the

Minamoto was a noble surname bestowed by the Emperors of Japan upon members of the imperial family who were excluded from the line of succession and demoted into the ranks of the nobility since 814."...the Minamoto (1192-1333)". ''Warrior Rule in Jap ...

, claiming descent from

Emperor Saga was the 52nd emperor of Japan, Emperor Saga, Saganoyamanoe Imperial Mausoleum, Imperial Household Agency according to the traditional order of succession. Saga's reign lasted from 809 to 823. Traditional narrative Saga was the second son of ...

(r. 809–823), who had a "navy" (or

Wokou ''Wokou'' ( zh, c=, p=Wōkòu; ; Hepburn romanization, Hepburn: ; ; literal Chinese translation: "dwarf bandits"), which translates to "Japanese pirates", were pirates who raided the coastlines of China and Korea from the 13th century to the 17 ...

). The castle, built in 1591 by Hideyoshi in preparation for his invasion of Korea, had a five-story tower (

Tenshu is an architectural typology found in Japanese castle, Japanese castle complexes. They are easily identifiable as the highest tower within the castle. Common translations of ''tenshu'' include keep, main keep, or ''donjon''. ''Tenshu'' are cha ...

) on the hill, a magnificent residential palace, and various outlying defenses covering 170,000 square meters. Within a 3 km radius were the camps of about 120 vassals. A town grew up around the military establishments, with a population of over 100,000 people at its height. After the death of Hideyoshi 18 September 1598, the invasion of Korea came to a halt and the castle is believed to have been abandoned at this time. It is said that construction materials were utilized by

Terazawa Hirotaka (1563 – May 18, 1633) was a Japanese ''daimyō'' of the early Edo period. He was a retainer of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and was the builder of Karatsu Castle. Life Hirotaka became lord of Karatsu in 1595. In 1598, he abandoned his original cast ...

(1563–1633) to build

Karatsu Castle is a Japanese castle located in Karatsu, Saga Prefecture, Japan. It is a ''hirayamajiro'', a castle built on a plain rather than a hill or mountain. At the end of the Edo period, Karatsu castle was home to the Ogasawara clan, ''daimyō'' of K ...

Literature

References

External links

Castles in Saga Prefecture {{castle-stub

History

See also

Literature

References

External links