or ''Second Hanzō'', nicknamed , was a famous

Ninja A or was a covert agent or mercenary in feudal Japan. The functions of a ninja included reconnaissance, espionage, infiltration, deception, ambush, bodyguarding and their fighting skills in martial arts, including ninjutsu.Kawakami, pp. 2 ...

of the Sengoku era, who served the

Tokugawa clan The is a Japanese dynasty that was formerly a powerful ''daimyō'' family. They nominally descended from Emperor Seiwa (850–880) and were a branch of the Minamoto clan (Seiwa Genji) through the Matsudaira clan. The early history of this clan r ...

as a ninja, credited with saving the life of

Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and first ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa Shogunate of Japan, which ruled Japan from 1603 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. He was one of the three "Great Unifiers" of Japan, along with his former lord Oda Nobunaga and fello ...

and then helping him to become the ruler of united Japan. He is often a subject of varied portrayal in modern

popular culture Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as, popular art or mass art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a ...

. Hanzō was known as an expert tactician and a master of

sword fighting Swordsmanship or sword fighting refers to the skills and techniques used in combat and training with any type of sword. The term is modern, and as such was mainly used to refer to smallsword fencing, but by extension it can also be applied to a ...

Early life

Born the son of (first Hanzō), a minor samurai in the service of the

Matsudaira The was a Japanese samurai clan that descended from the Minamoto clan. It originated in and took its name from Matsudaira village, in Mikawa Province (modern-day Aichi Prefecture). During the Sengoku period, the chieftain of the main line of ...

(later Tokugawa) clan. Stephen Turnbull, ''Ninja AD 1460–1650'' (2003), p. 12Joel Levy, ''Ninja: The Shadow Warrior'' (2008), p. 157-158 His birth name is , and he became known as the ''Second Hanzō''. He would later earn the nickname because of the fearless tactics he displayed in his operations; this moniker also distinguished him from Watanabe Hanzo (

Watanabe Moritsuna (1542–1620) was a Japanese samurai of the Watanabe clan, who served the Tokugawa clan. Born in Mikawa Province. He joined Ieyasu in 1557 and fought in such famous battles as the Battles of Anegawa (1570), Mikatagahara (1573) and Nagas ...

), who is nicknamed . Though Hanzō was born in

Mikawa Province was an old province in the area that today forms the eastern half of Aichi Prefecture. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''Mikawa''" in . Its abbreviated form name was . Mikawa bordered on Owari, Mino, Shinano, and Tōtōmi Provinces. Mi ...

(now Iga-chō,

Okazaki, Aichi is a city located in Aichi Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 386,999 in 164,087 households, and a population density of 999 persons per km². The total area of the city was . Geography Okazaki is in the coastal plains o ...

), he often returned to Iga Province, home of the Hattori family. At the age of 16, his first battle was a night time attack during the siege of Udo Castle (1557). At the time, he commanded seventy Iga ninja.

Service under Ieyasu

Hanzo had a great contribution to

's rise to power, helping the future Shogun bring down the Imagawa clan. After

Imagawa Ujizane was a Japanese ''daimyō'' who lived in the Sengoku through early Edo periods. He was the tenth head of the Imagawa clan, and was a son of Imagawa Yoshimoto and the father of Imagawa Norimochi and Shinagawa Takahisa. Biography Ujizane was ...

had held Ieyasu's wife and son as hostages in 1561, Hanzo made a successful hostage rescue of Tokugawa's family at Kaminogo castle in 1562 and went on to lay siege to Kakegawa castle in 1569 against the

Imagawa clan was a Japanese samurai clan that claimed descent from the Seiwa Genji by way of the Kawachi Genji. It was a branch of the Minamoto clan by the Ashikaga clan. Origins Ashikaga Kuniuji, grandson of Ashikaga Yoshiuji, established himself in ...

. He served with distinction at the battles of Anegawa in 1570 and Mikatagahara in 1572. According to the ''Kansei Chōshū Shokafu'', a

genealogy Genealogy () is the study of families, family history, and the tracing of their lineages. Genealogists use oral interviews, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kin ...

of major samurai completed in 1812 by the Tokugawa shogunate, Hattori Hanzō rendered meritorious service during the Battle of Mikatagahara and became commander of an Iga unit consisting of one hundred fifty men. He captured a Takeda spy named Chikuan, and when Takeda's troops invaded Totomi, Hanzō counterattacked with only thirty warriors at the

Tenryū River The is a river in central Honshū, Japan. With a length of , it is Japan's ninth longest river. Its source is Lake Suwa in the Kiso Mountains near Okaya in Nagano Prefecture. It then flows through Aichi Prefecture and western Shizuoka Prefect ...

. His most valuable contribution came in 1582 following Oda Nobunaga's death, when he led the future ''

shōgun , officially , was the title of the military dictators of Japan during most of the period spanning from 1185 to 1868. Nominally appointed by the Emperor, shoguns were usually the de facto rulers of the country, though during part of the Kamak ...

to safety in Mikawa Province across Iga territory with the help of remnants of the local

Iga-ryū is an umbrella term for ninjutsu traditions that come from the Iga region, according to Japanese legend. It became one of the two most well-known ninja traditions in Japan. The ''Iga-ryū'' traditions originated in the Iga Province in the area ...

ji-samurai The were lords of smaller rural domains in feudal Japan.Harold Britho, 'The Han', in John Whitney Hall, ed., ''The Cambridge History of Japan, volume 4: Early Modern Period'' (Cambridge UP, 1988), 183–234, They often used their relatively sma ...

clans as well as Kōga-ryū the neighboring local samurai families in the nearby Koka region. Hanzo was principal in serving as Ieyasu's guide and commanded 300

ninja A or was a covert agent or mercenary in feudal Japan. The functions of a ninja included reconnaissance, espionage, infiltration, deception, ambush, bodyguarding and their fighting skills in martial arts, including ninjutsu.Kawakami, pp. 2 ...

guards to ensure his lord's safe passage to Mikawa. In 1584, Hattori Hanzo continued to serve his lord at

Battle of Komaki and Nagakute The was a series of battles in 1584 between the forces of Hashiba Hideyoshi (who would become Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 1586) and the forces of Oda Nobukatsu and Tokugawa Ieyasu. Hideyoshi and Ieyasu had both served Oda Nobunaga and had not previou ...

with 100 warriors under his command. In 1590, Hattori Hanzo served during the Odawara campaign and was awarded 8,000 '' koku''. By the time Ieyasu entered Kantō, he was awarded an additional 8,000 ''koku'' and had 30 yoriki and 200 public officials for his services. Ieyasu was said to have also begun to employ more Iga

with Hanzō as their leader. Historical sources say he lived the last several years of his life as a monk under the name "Sainen" and built the temple Sainenji, which was named after him and mainly built to commemorate Tokugawa Ieyasu's elder son, Tokugawa Nobuyasu. After Nobuyasu was accused of treason and conspiracy by Oda Nobunaga and was then ordered to commit seppuku by his father, Ieyasu. Hanzo was called in to act as the official second to end Nobuyasu's suffering, but he refused to take the sword on the blood of his own lord. Ieyasu valued his loyalty after hearing of Hanzo's ordeal and said, "Even a demon can shed tears."

Death

He died at the age of 55 in 1597. There are two theories about his death. One asserts that he was assassinated by a rival Samurai, the pirate Fūma Kotarō. After Hanzo tracked him down to the Inland Sea, Kotarō lured him and his men into a small channel and used oil to set the channel on fire. The second theory is that Hanzo became a monk in Edo where he lived out the rest of his days until he died of illness.

Legacy

Hanzo's reputation as a samurai leader who commanded a 200-men strong unit of Iga warriors has grown to legendary proportions. Tales of Hattori's exploits often attributed various supernatural abilities, such as

teleportation Teleportation is the hypothetical transfer of matter or energy from one point to another without traversing the physical space between them. It is a common subject in science fiction literature and in other popular culture. Teleportation is oft ...

psychokinesis Psychokinesis (from grc, ψυχή, , soul and grc, κίνησις, , movement, label=ㅤ), or telekinesis (from grc, τηλε, , far off and grc, κίνησις, , movement, label=ㅤ), is a hypothetical psychic ability allowing a person ...

, and

precognition Precognition (from the Latin 'before', and 'acquiring knowledge') is the purported psychic phenomenon of seeing, or otherwise becoming directly aware of, events in the future. There is no accepted scientific evidence that precognition is a ...

. After his death on 4 November 1596, Hattori Hanzō was succeeded by his son, whose name was also Masanari (third Hanzō), though written with different

kanji are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese ...

(正就 instead of 正成). He was given the title of Iwami no Kami and his Iga men would act as guards of Edo Castle, the headquarters of the government of united Japan. Hanzō is actually a name passed down through the leaders of the Hattori family meaning his father was also called Hanzō and so was his successor. Indeed, there are five people known as Hattori Hanzō throughout history. HanzouMon

To this day, artifacts of Hanzō's legacy remain.

Tokyo Imperial Palace The is the main residence of the Emperor of Japan. It is a large park-like area located in the Chiyoda district of the Chiyoda ward of Tokyo and contains several buildings including the where the Emperor has his living quarters, the where va ...

(formerly the ''shōgun''s palace) still has a gate called Hanzō's Gate (Hanzōmon), and the Hanzōmon subway line which runs from Hanzōmon Station in central

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

to the southwestern suburbs is named after the gate, where his house was once located. The neighborhood outside Hanzō's Gate is known as Wakaba, but before 1943 was named Iga-chō ("Iga Town"). Hanzō's remains now rest in the Sainen-ji temple cemetery in

Yotsuya, Tokyo is a neighborhood in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan. It is a former ward (四谷区 ''Yotsuya-ku'') in the now-defunct Tokyo City. In 1947, when the 35 wards of Tokyo were reorganized into 23, it was merged with Ushigome ward of Tokyo City and Yodob ...

. The temple also holds his favorite spear and his ceremonial battle helmet. The spear, originally long and given to him by Ieyasu, was donated to the temple by Hanzō as a

votive offering A votive offering or votive deposit is one or more objects displayed or deposited, without the intention of recovery or use, in a sacred place for religious purposes. Such items are a feature of modern and ancient societies and are generally ...

, but was damaged during the

bombing of Tokyo The was a series of firebombing air raids by the United States Army Air Force during the Pacific campaigns of World War II. Operation Meetinghouse, which was conducted on the night of 9–10 March 1945, is the single most destructive bombin ...

in 1945. Stephen Turnbull, ''The Samurai Swordsman: Master of War'' (2008)

References

External links

Hattori Hanzô (Character)
at the

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