The , also known in English as the Former Nine Years' War or the Early Nine Years' War, was fought between the Imperial Court and the

Abe clan The was one of the oldest of the major Japanese clans (''uji''); and the clan retained its prominence during the Sengoku period and the Edo period.Meyer, Eva-Maria"Gouverneure von Kyôto in der Edo-Zeit." Universität Tübingen (in German). The ...

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 ...

, in Northeast Japan, from 1051 to 1063. It resulted in Imperial Court victory and the surrender of

Abe no Sadato was a samurai during the Heian period of Japan. In the Zenkunen War, Sadato fought alongside his father against the Minamoto. Life Sadatō was born in 1019, to the Abe clan, as the son of Abe no Yoritoki, the '' chinjufu-shōgun'' (general ...

. Like the other major conflicts of the Heian period, such as the

Gosannen War The Gosannen War (後三年合戦, ''gosannen kassen''), also known as the Later Three-Year War, was fought in the late 1080s in Japan's Mutsu Province on the island of Honshū. History The Gosannen War was part of a long struggle for power wi ...

and the

Genpei War The was a national civil war between the Taira and Minamoto clans during the late Heian period of Japan. It resulted in the downfall of the Taira and the establishment of the Kamakura shogunate under Minamoto no Yoritomo, who appointed himself ...

, the Zenkunen war was a struggle for power within the samurai clans.

Background

While most

provinces A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions outsi ...

were overseen by just a Governor, Mutsu, in what is now the Tohoku region, had a military general in charge of controlling the

Emishi The (also called Ebisu and Ezo), written with Chinese characters that literally mean "shrimp barbarians," constituted an ancient ethnic group of people who lived in parts of Honshū, especially in the Tōhoku region, referred to as in contemp ...

natives, who had been subjugated when the Japanese took over the area in the ninth century. Historically, this post was always held by a member of the

, and there were many conflicts between the Abe general and the Governor over administrative control of the province. In 1050, the general overseeing the Ainu was

Abe no Yoritoki (died 28 August 1057) was the head of the Abe clan of Emishi who were allowed to rule the six Emishi districts ( Iwate, Hienuki, Shiwa, Isawa, Esashi and Waga) in the from Morioka to Hiraizumi in what is now Iwate Prefecture. Background The ...

, who levied taxes and confiscated property on his own, rarely paying any heed to the wishes of the province's Governor. The Governor sent word to the capital in

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 ...

asking for help, and as a result

Minamoto no Yoriyoshi was a Japanese samurai lord who was the head of the Minamoto clan and served as '' Chinjufu-shōgun''. Along with his son Minamoto no Yoshiie, he led the Imperial forces against rebellious forces in the north, a campaign called the Zenkunen War, ...

was appointed both Governor and commander-in-chief over controlling the natives. He was sent with his son Yoshiie, then age fifteen, to stop Abe.

War

The fighting lasted for twelve years, or nine if one subtracts short periods of ceasefire and peace. Skirmishes were fierce and many, but few major battles were fought until the

Battle of Kawasaki The battle of Kawasaki was the first major battle of the Early Nine Years' War (Zenkunen War) (1051-1063). It was fought between the forces of the Abe clan, led by Abe no Sadato, and those of the Minamoto clan, acting as agents of the Imperial Cou ...

in 1057. Abe no Yoritoki had been killed shortly before, and the Minamoto were now fighting his son,

, who defeated them at Kawasaki and pursued them through a blizzard. The government forces, led by the Minamoto, had much trouble for quite some time, due to the harsh terrain and weather, but were eventually reinforced with new troops, including many offered by the Governor, a member of the

Kiyohara clan The was a powerful clan of the far north of Japan during the Heian period, descended from Prince Toneri, son of Emperor Tenmu (631–686). Kiyohara no Fusanori (9th century) had two sons: the elder was the ancestor of the samurai branch fam ...

, of the nearby

Dewa Province was a province of Japan comprising modern-day Yamagata Prefecture and Akita Prefecture, except for the city of Kazuno and the town of Kosaka. Dewa bordered on Mutsu and Echigō Provinces. Its abbreviated form name was . History Early peri ...

. In 1062, Minamoto no Yoriyoshi, along with his son, led an assault on an Abe fortress at

Siege of Kuriyagawa The siege of Kuriyagawa was a battle during the Heian period (11th century) of Japan. This rather minor siege, which was a part of the Zenkunen War, ended with the victory of the Minamoto. Throughout this siege, Abe commander Abe no Sadato ende ...

. They diverted the water supply, stormed the earthworks and stockade, and set the fortress aflame. After two days of fighting, Sadato surrendered.

Legacy

Minamoto no Yoshiie is thus considered the founder of the Minamoto clan's great martial legacy, and is worshiped as a particularly special and powerful ancestor ''

kami are the deities, divinities, spirits, phenomena or "holy powers", that are venerated in the Shinto religion. They can be elements of the landscape, forces of nature, or beings and the qualities that these beings express; they can also be the sp ...

'' of the clan. As a ''kami'' and a legend, he is often called ''Hachimantarō'', "Child of

Hachiman In Japanese religion, ''Yahata'' (八幡神, ancient Shinto pronunciation) formerly in Shinto and later commonly known as Hachiman (八幡神, Japanese Buddhist pronunciation) is the syncretic divinity of archery and war, incorporating elements f ...

, the god of war." A famous

renga ''Renga'' (, ''linked verse'') is a genre of Japanese collaborative poetry in which alternating stanzas, or ''ku (''句), of 5-7-5 and 7-7 mora (sound units, not to be confused with syllables) per line are linked in succession by multiple poets. ...

from the ''

Kokon Chomonjū , lit. ''A Collection of Notable Tales Old and New'', is a Kamakura-period collection of '' setsuwa''. It was compiled by and completed in 1254. The twenty volumes are divided by subject into thirty chapters: chapter 16 concerns art and painting ...

'' was exchanged between Sadato and Yoshiie when Sadato was forced to flee his castle on the Koromo River. Yoshiie said, ''Koromo no tate wa hokorobinikeri'', Koromo Castle has been destroyed ("The warps of your robe have come undone"), to which Sadato replied, ''toshi o heshi ito no midare no kurushisa ni'', "over the years its threads became tangled, and this pains me."

References

{{Authority control 11th century in Japan Wars involving Japan 1050s conflicts 1060s conflicts 1060s in Japan 1050s in Japan 1051 in Asia 1063 in Asia