was a Japanese adventurer who gained considerable influence in the Ayutthaya Kingdom at the beginning of the 17th century and became the governor of Nakhon Si Thammarat province, which is on the Malay Peninsula in present-day

Southern Thailand Southern Thailand, Southern Siam or Tambralinga is a southernmost cultural region of Thailand, separated from Central Thailand region by the Kra Isthmus. Geography Southern Thailand is on the Malay Peninsula, with an area of around , bounde ...

. From 1617 until his death in 1630, Yamada Nagamasa was head of the Thai village referred to as '' Ban Yipun'' ('Japanese village') in the Thai language. This village was within the city of Ayutthaya (the capital city of the Ayutthaya Kingdom). ''Ban Yipun'' was home to roughly 1,000 Japanese citizens and was headed by a Japanese chief who was nominated by Ayutthayan authorities. Its inhabitants were a combination of traders, Christian converts who had fled their home country following the persecutions of

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

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

Rōnin A ''rōnin'' ( ; ja, 浪人, , meaning 'drifter' or 'wanderer') was a samurai without a lord or master during the feudal period of Japan (1185–1868). A samurai became masterless upon the death of his master or after the loss of his master ...

(unemployed former

samurai were the hereditary military nobility and officer caste of medieval and early-modern Japan from the late 12th century until their abolition in 1876. They were the well-paid retainers of the '' daimyo'' (the great feudal landholders). They h ...

) who had been on the losing side at the Battle of Sekigahara (1600) or the

Siege of Osaka The was a series of battles undertaken by the Japanese Tokugawa shogunate against the Toyotomi clan, and ending in that clan's destruction. Divided into two stages (winter campaign and summer campaign), and lasting from 1614 to 1615, the siege ...

(1614–15). The Christian community seems to have been in the hundreds, as described by Padre António Francisco Cardim, who recounted having administered sacraments to around 400 Japanese Christians in 1627 in the city of Ayutthaya.

Early life

Yamada Nagamasa was born in

Numazu, Shizuoka is a city located in eastern Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 189,486 in 91,986 households, and a population density of 1,014 persons per km2. The total area of the city is . Geography Numazu is at the nor ...

in 1590. He is said to have been a

palanquin The litter is a class of wheelless vehicles, a type of human-powered transport, for the transport of people. Smaller litters may take the form of open chairs or beds carried by two or more carriers, some being enclosed for protection from the el ...

bearer for the lord of Numazu. He became involved in Japanese trade activities with

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...

during the period of the

Red seal ships were Japanese armed merchant sailing ships bound for Southeast Asian ports with red-sealed letters patent issued by the early Tokugawa shogunate in the first half of the 17th century. Between 1600 and 1635, more than 350 Japanese ships went ...

and settled in the Ayutthaya Kingdom (modern-day Thailand) around 1612.

Career

Yamada Nagamasa is alleged to have carried on the business of a

privateer A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...

from the period of 1620, attacking and plundering Dutch ships in and around Batavia (present-day Jakarta). Stories of Yamada burying his treasure on the east coast of Australia (and in particular,

Magnetic Island Magnetic Island ( Wulguru: Yunbenun) is an island offshore from the city of Townsville, Queensland, Australia. This mountainous island in Cleveland Bay has effectively become a suburb of Townsville, with 2,335 permanent residents. The islan ...

off

Townsville Townsville is a city on the north-eastern coast of Queensland, Australia. With a population of 180,820 as of June 2018, it is the largest settlement in North Queensland; it is unofficially considered its capital. Estimated resident population, 3 ...

) persist but it is highly unlikely that Yamada would have ventured into that area as there were no trade routes in this region and the only ships to venture to this region were the ones blown off course during the summer storms. Furthermore, Yamada would have passed thousands of islands in the

Torres Strait The Torres Strait (), also known as Zenadh Kes, is a strait between Australia and the Melanesian island of New Guinea. It is wide at its narrowest extent. To the south is Cape York Peninsula, the northernmost extremity of the Australian mai ...

and Coral Sea and these would have provided safekeeping for any treasure and avoided a very long recovery voyage in the future. The ''Ban Yipun'' colony was active in trade, particularly in the export of deer hide to Japan in exchange for Japanese silver and handicrafts (swords, lacquered boxes, high-quality papers). The Japanese were noted by the Dutch for challenging the trade monopoly of the

Dutch East India Company The United East India Company ( nl, Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the VOC) was a chartered company established on the 20th March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies into the first joint-stock ...

(''Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie''). The colony also had an important military role in the Ayutthaya Kingdom.

Military involvement and lordship

The Japanese colony was highly valued for its military expertise, and was organized under a "Department of Japanese Volunteers" (''Krom Asa Yipun'') by the King of Ayutthaya. In the space of 15 years, Yamada Nagamasa rose from the low Thai nobility rank of '' Khun'' to the senior of ''Ok-ya'', his title becoming ''Ok-ya Senaphimuk (Thai : ออกญาเสนาภิมุข)''. He became the head of the Japanese colony, and in this position supported the military campaigns of King

Songtham Songtham ( th, ทรงธรรม, ) or Intharacha III was the King of Ayutthaya from 1610/11 to 1628 of the House of Sukhothai. His reign marked the prosperity of the Ayutthaya kingdom after it regained independence from Toungoo Dynasty, and ...

, at the head of a Japanese army flying the

Japanese flag The national flag of Japan is a rectangular white banner bearing a crimson-red circle at its center. This flag is officially called the , but is more commonly known in Japan as the . It embodies the country's sobriquet: the Land of the Rising S ...

. He fought successfully, and was finally nominated Ligor (modern

Nakhon Si Thammarat Nakhon Si Thammarat Municipality ( th, เทศบาลนครนครศรีธรรมราช, ; from Pali ''Nagara Sri Dhammaraja'') is a municipality (''thesaban nakhon'') in Southern Thailand, capital of Nakhon Si Thammarat pro ...

), in the southern peninsula in 1630, accompanied by 300 samurai.

Travels between Siam and Japan

After more than 12 years in

Siam Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

, Yamada Nagamasa went to Japan in 1624 on board one of his ships, where he sold a cargo of Siamese deer hide in

Nagasaki is the capital and the largest Cities of Japan, city of Nagasaki Prefecture on the island of Kyushu in Japan. It became the sole Nanban trade, port used for trade with the Portuguese and Dutch during the 16th through 19th centuries. The Hi ...

. He stayed in Japan for three years, trying to obtain a Red Seal permit, but finally left in 1627, with the simple status of a foreign ship. In 1626, Nagamasa offered a painting of one of his

warship A warship or combatant ship is a naval ship that is built and primarily intended for naval warfare. Usually they belong to the armed forces of a state. As well as being armed, warships are designed to withstand damage and are usually faster ...

to a temple of his hometown in Shizuoka. That painting was lost in a fire, but a copy of it remains to this day. It portrays a ship with Western-style rigging, 18 cannons, and sailors in samurai gear. He returned to Siam in 1627. In 1628, one of his ships transporting rice from Ayutthaya to Malacca was arrested by a Dutch warship blockading the city. The ship was released once the identity of the owner became clear, since the Dutch knew that Yamada was held in great respect by the King of Siam, and they did not wish to enter into a diplomatic conflict. Yamada was also valued by the Dutch as a supplier of deer hide, and they invited him to trade more with Batavia.Accounts of the castle of Batavia, March 1, 1628

Death

In 1629, Yamada Nagamasa visited Japan with a delegation from King Songtham. He soon travelled back to Siam, but became involved in a succession war following the death of the King Songtham by

Prasat Thong Prasat ThongThe Royal Institute. List of monarchs Ayutthaya''. ( th, ปราสาททอง, ; c. 1600–1656; 1629–1656) was the first king of the Prasat Thong dynasty, the fourth dynasty of the Siamese Ayutthaya Kingdom. Accounts vary ...

. Prasat Thong had acted as "king-maker" before assuming the throne, by performing the double

regicide Regicide is the purposeful killing of a monarch or sovereign of a polity and is often associated with the usurpation of power. A regicide can also be the person responsible for the killing. The word comes from the Latin roots of ''regis'' ...

of King Songtham's sons. Yamada or Okya Seniphimok, heard of the coup at Ayutthaya and rebelled. Prasat Thong had Praya Chaiya poison him in 1630, and then expelled the remaining Japanese.Chakrabongse, C., 1960, Lords of Life, London: Alvin Redman Limited

End of relations between Siam and Japan

Following Yamada's death in 1630, the new ruler and

usurper A usurper is an illegitimate or controversial claimant to power, often but not always in a monarchy. In other words, one who takes the power of a country, city, or established region for oneself, without any formal or legal right to claim it as ...

king of Siam Prasat Thong (1630–1655) sent an army of 4,000 soldiers to destroy the Japanese settlement in Ayutthaya, but many Japanese managed to flee to the Khmer Kingdom. A few years later in 1633, returnees (300–400 Japanese) from Indochina were able to re-establish the Japanese settlement in Ayutthaya. From 1634, the ''

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 ...

'', informed of these troubles and what he perceived as attacks on his authority, refused to issue further Red Seal ship permits for Siam. Desirous to renew trade, however, the king of Siam sent a trading ship and an embassy to Japan in 1636, but the embassies were rejected by the shogun, thus putting an end to direct relations between Japan and Siam. Japan was concomitantly closing itself to the world at that time, a period known as Sakoku. The Dutch took advantage of the Japanese withdrawal, increasing their trade and offering naval support. Japan lost influence for 300 years after being expelled by Prasat Thong.

Memorial

Yamada now rests in his hometown in the area of Otani. The remnants of the Japanese quarters in Ayutthuya are still visible to visitors, as well as a statue of Yamada in Siamese military uniform.

Film adaptations of Yamada's life

* ''The Gaijin'' (山田長政王者の剣) – 1959 * ''Southern Cross: The Strange Tale of Cornelia Oyuki and Nagamasa Yamada'' (南十字星コルネリアお雪異聞わたしの山田長政) (TV movie) - 1978 * '' Yamada: The Samurai of Ayothaya'' – 2010