is a

Japanese castle are fortresses constructed primarily of wood and stone. They evolved from the wooden stockades of earlier centuries and came into their best-known form in the 16th century. Castles in Japan were built to guard important or strategic sites, such a ...

located in

Utsunomiya is the capital and largest city of Tochigi Prefecture in the northern Kantō region of Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 513,584, and a population density of . The total area of the city is . Utsunomiya is famous for its ''gyoza'' ...

, central

Tochigi Prefecture is a landlocked Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Tochigi Prefecture has a population of 1,897,649 (1 June 2023) and has a geographic area of 6,408 Square kilometre, km2 (2,474 Square mile, sq mi ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. At the end of the

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

, Utsunomiya Castle was home to a branch of the Toda clan, ''

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 no ...

'' of

Utsunomiya Domain was a Han (Japan), feudal domain under the Tokugawa shogunate of Edo period Japan, located in Shimotsuke Province (modern-day Tochigi Prefecture), Japan. It was centered on Utsunomiya Castle in what is now part of the city of Utsunomiya, Tochigi ...

History

Early history

Utsunomiya Castle was first built in the

Heian period The is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. It followed the Nara period, beginning when the 50th emperor, Emperor Kammu, moved the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). means in Japanese. It is a ...

by either

Fujiwara Hidesato was a Japanese aristocrat, courtier, folk hero and samurai lord of the tenth century in the Heian period. He is famous for his military exploits and courage, and is regarded as the common ancestor of numerous clans, including the Ōshū branch ...

or Fujiwara Sōen around the year 1063. This castle was built on a small hill south of Utsunomiya Futarayama Jinja, the ''

ichinomiya is a Japanese language, Japanese historical term referring to the Shinto shrines with the highest rank in a Provinces of Japan, province. Shrines of lower rank were designated , , , and so forth.''Encyclopedia of Shinto'' ''Ichi no miya'' retr ...

'' of

Shimotsuke Province was a Provinces of Japan, province of Japan in the area of Japan that is today Tochigi Prefecture.Louis-Frédéric, Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''SHimotsuke''" in . Shimotsuke was bordered by Kōzuke Province, Kōzuke, Hitachi Province, ...

, on a juncture of the

Ōshū Kaidō The was one of the centrally administered Edo Five Routes, five routes of the Edo period. It was built to connect the ''de facto'' capital of Japan at Edo (modern-day Tokyo) with Mutsu Province and the present-day city of Shirakawa, Fukushima, S ...

and the

Nikkō Kaidō The was one of the centrally administered Edo Five Routes, five routes of the Edo period. It was built to connect the ''de facto'' capital of Japan at Edo (modern-day Tokyo) with the temple-shrine complex of the Mangan-ji and Tōshōsha (now cal ...

highways. Fujiwara Sōen played an important role in the

Former Nine Years War 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 in Mutsu Province, in Northeast Japan, from 1051 to 1062. It resulted in Imperial Court victory and ...

and was the ancestor of the Utsunomiya clan, who dominated the area for the next 500 years, through the

Kamakura , officially , is a city of Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan. It is located in the Kanto region on the island of Honshu. The city has an estimated population of 172,929 (1 September 2020) and a population density of 4,359 people per km2 over the tota ...

and

Muromachi period The , also known as the , is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate ( or ), which was officially established in 1338 by the first Muromachi ...

s. During the

Sengoku period The was the period in History of Japan, Japanese history in which civil wars and social upheavals took place almost continuously in the 15th and 16th centuries. The Kyōtoku incident (1454), Ōnin War (1467), or (1493) are generally chosen as th ...

, the castle was greatly enlarged, enclosing an area over four kilometers in diameter with a series of concentric moats and high earthen ramparts, and came to be renowned as one of the seven major castles of the

Kantō region The is a geography, geographical region of Honshu, the largest island of Japan. In a common definition, the region includes the Greater Tokyo Area and encompasses seven prefectures of Japan, prefectures: Chiba Prefecture, Chiba, Gunma Prefe ...

. The Utsunomiya successfully defended the castle against repeated attacks by the Odawara Hōjō clan. However, the Utsunomiya clan was dispossessed of their holdings in 1597 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: ...

, and the castle came under the control of the Gamo clan, based in

Aizu is the westernmost of the three regions of Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, the other two regions being Nakadōri in the central area of the prefecture and Hamadōri in the east. As of October 1, 2010, it had a population of 291,838. The princ ...

. With the establishment of the

Tokugawa shogunate The Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the was the military government of Japan during the Edo period from 1603 to 1868. The Tokugawa shogunate was established by Tokugawa Ieyasu after victory at the Battle of Sekigahara, ending the civil wars ...

, Utsunomiya Castle became the center of Utsunomiya Domain, ruled by a succession of daimyo clans, beginning with the Okudaira in 1601. In 1619,

Honda Masazumi (1566 – April 5, 1637) was a Japanese samurai of the Azuchi–Momoyama period through early Edo period, who served the Tokugawa clan. He later became a ''daimyō'', and one of the first rōjū of the Tokugawa shogunate. Masazumi was born in 15 ...

was appointed daimyo of Utsunomiya. Assisted by an able administrative staff, he largely reconstructed the castle and hosted Shōgun

Tokugawa Hidetada was the second ''shōgun'' of the Tokugawa dynasty, who ruled from 1605 until his abdication in 1623. He was the third son of Tokugawa Ieyasu. Early life (1579–1593) Tokugawa Hidetada was born to Tokugawa Ieyasu and the Lady Saigō on May ...

in the new palace when the shōgun was on his way to worship at the

Nikkō Tōshō-gū is a Tōshō-gū Shinto shrine located in Nikkō, Tochigi Prefecture, Japan. Together with Futarasan Shrine and Rinnō-ji, it forms the Shrines and Temples of Nikkō UNESCO World Heritage Site, with 42 structures of the shrine included in the ...

. However, Honda Masazumi was accused in 1622 by his political enemies on trumped-up charges of planning to assassinate the shōgun using a trap with a falling ceiling in the shogunal guest chamber, and was exiled to

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 per ...

(the incident was romanticized in the film ''

The Ceiling at Utsunomiya ''The'' is a grammatical article in English, denoting nouns that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The' ...

'', directed by

Nobuo Nakagawa was a Japanese film director, most famous for the stylized, Folklore, folk tale-influenced horror films he made in the 1950s and 1960s. Career Born in Kyoto, Nakagawa was early on influenced by proletarian literature and wrote amateur film revi ...

in 1956). Finally this Ni-no-maru Palace burned down in 1683. During the

Boshin War The , sometimes known as the Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War, was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a coalition seeking to seize political power in the name of the Impe ...

of 1868, Utsunomiya Domain sided with the Imperial cause but came under attack by a pro-Tokugawa army led by

Ōtori Keisuke Baron was a Japanese military leader and diplomat.Perez, Louis G. (2013)"Ōtori Keisuke"in ''Japan at War: An Encyclopedia,'' p. 304. Biography Early life and education Ōtori Keisuke was born in Akamatsu Village, in the Akō domain of Harim ...

and former

Shinsengumi The was a small secret police organization, elite group of swordsmen that was organized by commoners and low rank samurai, commissioned by the (military government) during Japan's Bakumatsu period (late Tokugawa shogunate) in 1863. It was ac ...

leader

Hijikata Toshizō was a Japanese swordsman of the ''Bakumatsu'' period and of the ''Shinsengumi''. As Vice-Commander, he served the Tokugawa Shogunate and co-led his group in its resistance against the imperial rule brought about by the Meiji Restoration. He ...

. The castle fell to the pro-Tokugawa forces after a fierce battle during which most of the structures were destroyed. Unable to hold the castle due to their limited numbers, the pro-Shogunal army soon abandoned the site and moved north. Following the establishment of the

Meiji government The was the government that was formed by politicians of the Satsuma Domain and Chōshū Domain in the 1860s. The Meiji government was the early government of the Empire of Japan. Politicians of the Meiji government were known as the Meiji ...

, the site of the castle was used as a garrison location for the

Imperial Japanese Army The Imperial Japanese Army (IJA; , ''Dai-Nippon Teikoku Rikugun'', "Army of the Greater Japanese Empire") was the principal ground force of the Empire of Japan from 1871 to 1945. It played a central role in Japan’s rapid modernization during th ...

until 1890, when it was given over to private hands, with the central portion becoming a public park. In 2007, a large section of the walls, moats and two '' yagura'' on the site of the central bailey were reconstructed.

Literature

* * * * *

External links

Japanese Castles
{{Authority control Castles in Tochigi Prefecture