Sōma Yoshitane (1548–1635) was the 16th hereditary chieftain of the

Sōma clan The was a Japanese samurai clan who ruled the northern Hamadōri region of southern Mutsu Province in the Tōhoku region of northern Japan for over 700 years, from the Kamakura period through the Meiji Restoration of 1868. The Sōma claimed de ...

and a

Sengoku period The was a period in History of Japan, Japanese history of near-constant civil war and social upheaval from 1467 to 1615. The Sengoku period was initiated by the Ōnin War in 1467 which collapsed the Feudalism, feudal system of Japan under the ...

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 n ...

'' with territories covering the three districts forming the northern

Hamadōri is the easternmost of the three regions of Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, the other two being Nakadōri in the central area of the prefecture and Aizu in the west. Hamadōri is bordered by the Abukuma Highlands to the west and the Pacific Ocean t ...

region of southern

Mutsu Province was an old province of Japan in the area of Fukushima, Miyagi, Iwate and Aomori Prefectures and the municipalities of Kazuno and Kosaka in Akita Prefecture. Mutsu Province is also known as or . The term is often used to refer to the comb ...

.Monogatari: Hanshi Volume 1, Kodama Kota, ed. Tokyo: Shin Jinbutsu Oraisha, 1966, p. 278

Biography

Yoshitane was the eldest son of Sōma Moritane, the 15th chieftain of the Sōma clan. At the time, the clan was based at Odaka Castle. In 1559, the clan was approached by

Date Tanemune was a Japanese samurai warrior and Date clan leader during the Sengoku period. Biography He was born as the eldest son of Date Hisamune. His childhood name was Jiro (次郎). At the death of his father, he became ''daimyō'' of Mutsu Province ...

and was offered a matrimonial alliance. Yoshitane was wed to Tanemune's younger daughter, Kosugō Gozen the following year. However, following the death of Tanemune in 1565, the ancient enmity between the Sōma and Date clans flared up again in a border dispute, and Yoshitane divorced Kosugō Gozen and sent her back to the Date clan. Yoshitane fought the Date clan many times, as the Date invaded his domain on 30 occasions. Both Sōma Yoshitane and

Date Masamune was a regional ruler of Japan's Azuchi–Momoyama period through early Edo period. Heir to a long line of powerful ''daimyō'' in the Tōhoku region, he went on to found the modern-day city of Sendai. An outstanding tactician, he was made all ...

submitted 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 ...

at the Siege of Odawara. At the time of the

Battle of Sekigahara The Battle of Sekigahara (Shinjitai: ; Kyūjitai: , Hepburn romanization: ''Sekigahara no Tatakai'') was a decisive battle on October 21, 1600 (Keichō 5, 15th day of the 9th month) in what is now Gifu prefecture, Japan, at the end of ...

, the Sōma attempted to remain neutral for fear of the powerful

Satake clan The was a Japanese samurai clan that claimed descent from the Minamoto clan. Its first power base was in Hitachi Province. The clan was subdued by Minamoto no Yoritomo in the late 12th century, but later entered Yoritomo's service as vassals ...

to the south, which was allied with

Ishida Mitsunari Ishida Mitsunari (, 1559 – November 6, 1600) was a Japanese samurai and military commander of the late Sengoku period of Japan. He is probably best remembered as the commander of the Western army in the Battle of Sekigahara following the A ...

through marriage ties. The new

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate (, Japanese 徳川幕府 ''Tokugawa bakufu''), also known as the , was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"''Tokugawa-jidai''"in ''Japan Encyclopedia ...

initially decided to seize the Sōma territories, but through the intervention of several senior retainers (including their former arch-enemy Date Masamune), the shogunate relented and appointed Yoshitanes son, Sōma Toshitane as a

tozama daimyō was a class of powerful magnates or ''daimyō'' (大名) considered to be outsiders by the ruler of Japan.Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, ''Tozama daimyō'' were classified in the Tokugawa Shogunate (江戸幕府) as ''daimyō'' w ...

over a 60,000

koku The is a Chinese-based Japanese unit of volume. 1 koku is equivalent to 10 or approximately , or about . It converts, in turn, to 100 shō and 1000 gō. One ''gō'' is the volume of the "rice cup", the plastic measuring cup that is supplied ...

Sōma Nakamura Domain which encompassed their traditional holdings.

Notes

Daimyo 1548 births 1635 deaths {{Daimyo-stub