was a

Momoyama period Momoyama may refer to: History *Azuchi–Momoyama period, the final phase of the Sengoku period in Japanese history 1568–1600 People * Ion Momoyama, Japanese singer and voice actor * Momoyama Kenichi (1909–1991), Korean prince and cavalry offi ...

Japanese courtier known as a poet, calligrapher, painter and diarist. Having no legitimate son, he adopted his nephew Nobuhiro as his heir. Other names he is known by are Nobumoto (信基) and Nobusuke (信輔) in his early life, and Sanmyakuin (三藐院), his title in his late period. In

Japanese calligraphy also called is a form of calligraphy, or artistic writing, of the Japanese language. Written Japanese was originally based on Chinese characters only, but the advent of the hiragana and katakana Japanese syllabaries resulted in intrin ...

he is distinguished as one of the ''Kan'ei Sanpitsu'' (寛永三筆) or "Three Brushes of the Kan'ei period", named in imitation of the

Heian period The is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. It followed the Nara period, beginning when the 50th emperor, Emperor Kanmu, moved the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). means "peace" in Japanese. ...

Sanpitsu {{no footnotes, date=October 2019 The term ''Sanpitsu'' (三筆) or "three brushes" is used in Japanese to refer to a group of three famous Heian period calligraphers: *Emperor Saga 嵯峨天皇, 786–842. *Kūkai 空海, 774–835. *Tachibana no ...

Family and early life

He is a son of

Konoe Sakihisa (1536 – June 7, 1612), son of regent Taneie, was a court noble of Japan. His life spanned the Sengoku, Azuchi–Momoyama, and early Edo periods. He served as kampaku-sadaijin and '' daijō-daijin'', rising to the junior first rank. He was ...

by a lady of waiting whose name is unknown. 1577 he held his

genpuku is a Japanese coming-of-age ceremony which dates back to Japan's classical Nara Period (710–794 AD). /sup> This ceremony marked the transition from child to adult status and the assumption of adult responsibilities. The age of participat ...

and was named Nobumoto.

Oda Nobunaga was a Japanese ''daimyō'' and one of the leading figures of the Sengoku period. He is regarded as the first "Great Unifier" of Japan. Nobunaga was head of the very powerful Oda clan, and launched a war against other ''daimyō'' to unify ...

led the ceremony and gave one letter of his name 信 (Nobu) to the young noble. Later he changed his name Nobusuke. In 1580 he was appointed to

naidaijin The , literally meaning "Inner Minister", was an ancient office in the Japanese imperial court, Japanese Imperial Court. Its role, rank and authority varied throughout the pre-Meiji period, Meiji period of Japanese history, but in general remain ...

, in 1585

sadaijin The ''Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary'', Kenkyusha Limited, was a government position in Japan in the late Nara and Heian periods. The position was consolidated in the Taihō Code of 702. The Asuka Kiyomihara Code of 689 marks the ini ...

respectively. He held the position of sadaijin until 1591. He was also the tutor of the noble lady, calligrapher and poet, Ono Otsu. In 1585 he got into troubles with kanpaku

Nijō Akizane , son of regent Nijō Haruyoshi, was a Japanese '' kugyō'' (court noble) of the Azuchi–Momoyama period and the early Edo period. He held the regent position of '' kanpaku'' two times: once in 1585, and again from 1615 to 1619. He married a daugh ...

in relation to

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 ...

and his planned appointment to sadaijin, the position Nobusuke held at the time of the dispute, today known as ''kanpaku sōron'' ( 関白相論). The court meant to appoint Nobusuke to kanpaku succeeding to Nijō Akizane who had been appointed to this position this year. Generally this succession seemed inevitable but those two disagrees in details. Both issued their opinion of letters to the court and the dispute was not settled at the court. Then both visited Hideyoshi to justify each of their opinions. Consequently, Hideyoshi asked for kanpuku position instead of sadaijin which the court had originally meant to give him. For enabling this appointment, since only males of

Sekke The Five Regent Houses (五摂家; ''go-sekke'') is a collective term for the five families of the Fujiwara clan that monopolized the regent position of '' Sekkan'' in Japan from 1252 until 1868. The five houses are Konoe, Takatsukasa, Kujō, Ic ...

was considered to be eligible to kanpaku position, Hideyoshi also asked for adoption to

, the father of Nobutada and the contemporary family head of the Konoe, with a promise that Nobusuke would succeed to Hideyoshi as kanpaku. This promise however didn't come true and

Toyotomi Hidetsugu was a daimyō during the Sengoku period of Japan. He was the nephew and retainer of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the unifier and ruler of Japan from 1590 to 1598. Despite being Hideyoshi's closest adult, male relative, Hidetsugu was accused of atrocities ...

, a nephew of Hideyoshi was appointed to kanpaku in 1591. In this year in disappointment Nobutada resigned from sadaijin and entered into his retirement.

Late life

In 1594 Nobutada got an anger of

Emperor Go-Yōzei was the 107th Emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. Go-Yōzei's reign spanned the years 1586 through to his abdication in 1611, corresponding to the transition between the Azuchi–Momoyama period and the Edo period ...

and was exiled to Bonotsu in

Satsuma province was an old province of Japan that is now the western half of Kagoshima Prefecture on the island of Kyūshū. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "Satsuma" in . Its abbreviation is . History Satsuma's provincial capital was Satsumasendai. Durin ...

Kyūshū is the third-largest island of Japan's five main islands and the most southerly of the four largest islands ( i.e. excluding Okinawa). In the past, it has been known as , and . The historical regional name referred to Kyushu and its surround ...

. He stayed there for three years. In September 1596 he received the imperial permission to return to

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

and held his sadaijin position again. In 1605 he was appointed to kanpaku finally.

References

* The Calligrapher Konoe Nobutada: Reassessing the Influence of Aristocrats on the Art and Politics of Early Seventeenth-Century Japan, by Lee Bruschke-Johnson. Doctoral dissertation, 2002. * Dismissed as Elegant Fossils: Konoe Nobutada and the Role of Aristocrats in Early Modern Japan, by Lee Bruschke-Johnson. Amsterdam: Hotei, 2004.

External links

Momoyama, Japanese Art in the Age of Grandeur
an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Konoe Nobutada {{DEFAULTSORT:Konoe, Nobutada 1565 births 1614 deaths Japanese calligraphers Konoe family Fujiwara clan Japanese diarists 16th-century diarists 17th-century diarists