is a

castle A castle is a type of fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by military orders. Scholars debate the scope of the word ''castle'', but usually consider it to be the private fortified r ...

located in Aya,

Miyazaki Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyūshū. Miyazaki Prefecture has a population of 1,073,054 (1 June 2019) and has a geographic area of 7,735 km2 (2,986 sq mi). Miyazaki Prefecture borders Ōita Prefecture to the north, Kuma ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

History

Aya was built from around 1331 to about 1334. Its name derives from the man who oversaw the construction of the castle, who referred to himself only as "Aya" (his real name was Koshiro Yoshito). His family ruled over the castle until the

Muromachi period The is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate (''Muromachi bakufu'' or ''Ashikaga bakufu''), which was officially established in 1338 by t ...

, when the head of the

Itō clan The are a Japanese clan of ''gōzoku'' that claimed descent from the Fujiwara clan through Fujiwara Korekimi (727–789) and Kudō Ietsugu. Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon''; Papin ...

took over Aya Castle, which was one of 48 under their control and considered to be their most strategic against the Shimazu. The

Shimazu clan The were the ''daimyō'' of the Satsuma han, which spread over Satsuma, Ōsumi and Hyūga provinces in Japan. The Shimazu were identified as one of the '' tozama'' or outsider ''daimyō'' familiesAppert, Georges ''et al.'' (1888). in contrast ...

seized the castle following their victory over the Itō in 1577. The castle was then given to Niiro Hisatoki, one of the retainers for the Shimazu Clan.

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

conquered the castle for a short period ten years later. In 1615, however, the castle was destroyed due to a shogunal decree that every domain could have only one castle. The castle keep, or ''tenshu'', was rebuilt in 1985 out of wood, and was based on pictures of other castles of the era. It houses a museum that has items pertaining to the castle's history.

References

{{coord, 32.003218, 131.249113, format=dms, display=title, type:landmark_region:JP_scale:10000 Castles in Miyazaki Prefecture

History

Further reading

References