The occurred in 1578, when the army of

Mōri Terumoto Mōri Terumoto (毛利輝元, January 22, 1553 – June 2, 1625) was a Japanese ''daimyō''. The son of Mōri Takamoto, and grandson and successor of the great warlord Mōri Motonari, he fought against Oda Nobunaga but was eventually overc ...

attacked and captured the castle of Kōzuki in

Harima Province or Banshū (播州) was a province of Japan in the part of Honshū that is the southwestern part of present-day Hyōgo Prefecture. Harima bordered on Tajima, Tanba, Settsu, Bizen, and Mimasaka Provinces. Its capital was Himeji. During th ...

. Kōzuki had been taken by

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

the previous year and entrusted to

Amago Katsuhisa was a remnant of the Amago clan, a powerful feudal clan in the Chūgoku region of Japan, backed up by Yamanaka Yukimori, a vassal of the clan. He was born to Amago Masahisa in 1553. In the following year, Katsuhisa's father and grandfather were ...

. When it fell to the Mōri, Amago committed ''

hara-kiri , also known as , is a form of Japanese ritualistic suicide by disembowelment. It was originally reserved for samurai in their code of honor, but was also practiced by other Japanese people during the Shōwa era (particularly officers near t ...

''. Amago's loyal and heroic general

Yamanaka Yukimori , also known as Yamanaka Shikanosuke (山中鹿の介) or Shikasuke (鹿の介), was a Japanese samurai of the Sengoku period. He served the Amago clan of Izumo Province. Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"Yamanaka Shikanosuke"in ''Japan Encyc ...

was captured and executed.

Background

Oda Nobunaga was a Japanese ''daimyō'' and one of the leading figures of the Sengoku period, Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods. He was the and regarded as the first "Great Unifier" of Japan. He is sometimes referred as the "Demon Daimyō" and "Demo ...

was running out of qualified battle-hardened lords to hold his territories, so

though a member of the

Amago clan The , descended from the Emperor Uda (868–897) by the Kyogoku clan, descending from the Sasaki clan (Uda Genji). Kyogoku Takahisa in the 14th century, lived in Amako-go (Izumo Province), and took the name 'Amago'. The family crest is also t ...

samurai class, who was not especially experienced or trained as a warrior, he was called to become lord of Kōzuki castle from Kyoto, where he was studying to be a Buddhist monk.

Siege

sent the Mōri's "Two Rivers",

Kobayakawa Takakage was a samurai and daimyō (feudal military lord) during the Sengoku period and Azuchi–Momoyama period. He was the third son of Mōri Motonari who was adopted by the Kobayakawa clan and became its 14th clan head. He merged the two branches of ...

and

Kikkawa Motoharu was the second son of Mōri Motonari, and featured prominently in all the wars of the Mōri clan. He became an active commander of the Mōri army and he with his brother Kobayakawa Takakage became known as the “Mōri Ryōsen", or “Mōri's T ...

to attack Kōzuki castle. The Amago forces under

were so vastly outnumbered and surrounded in the castle that victory was impossible. Yukimori sent a message to the Mōri general offering to surrender, and offering the ritual suicide of his master (Amago Katsuhisa). The offer was accepted, Amago forces surrendered, and Katsuhisa committed suicide.

Aftermath

Katsuhisa was very young, in his early twenties, when he died. A memorial stone stands with his name engraved, along with Buddhist inscriptions, where he killed himself. It is popularly believed in Japan that Yamanaka Yukimori, Amago's general, "sold" Amago's life, for the safety of his own. What precisely happened to Yamanaka Yukimori after the battle is unclear. Though some sources say he died in the battle, others state that he became a vassal of the enemy lord, Mōri Terumoto, but was assassinated on Mōri's order (along with his new wife).

References

1578 in Japan Sieges of the Sengoku period 16th-century military history of Japan Conflicts in 1578 Mōri clan Ukita clan Attacks on castles in Japan Military history of Hyōgo Prefecture Harima Province {{Japan-battle-stub