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, suc ...

located in Numata, northern

Gunma Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Gunma Prefecture has a population of 1,937,626 (1 October 2019) and has a geographic area of 6,362 km2 (2,456 sq mi). Gunma Prefecture borders Niigata Prefecture and Fukushim ...

, Japan. At the end of the

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional ''daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was character ...

, Numata Castle was home to the

Toki clan The is a Japanese kin group. Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d’histoire et de géographie du Japon''; Papinot, (2003)"Toki," ''Nobiliare du Japon'', p. 61 retrieved 2013-5-9. History The Toki claim descent from Minamot ...

, ''

daimyō were powerful Japanese magnates, feudal lords who, from the 10th century to the early Meiji period in the middle 19th century, ruled most of Japan from their vast, hereditary land holdings. They were subordinate to the shogun and nominall ...

'' of Numata Domain, but the castle was ruled by various clans over its history, and is noted as the site of a major battle in the Sengoku period. The castle was also known as .

History

During the

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

, the area around Numata was controlled by the Numata clan, with a fortification built on this location by Numata Akiyasu in 1532. Sanada Masayuki, a vassal of

Takeda Katsuyori was a Japanese '' daimyō'' of the Sengoku period, who was famed as the head of the Takeda clan and the successor to the legendary warlord Takeda Shingen. He was son in law of Hojo Ujiyasu. Early life He was the son of Shingen by the daugh ...

captured the castle in 1580, and most of the Numata clan perished in a failed attempt to retake their ancestral home the following year. The area was subsequently contested between the

Sanada clan The is a Japanese clan. Papinot, Jacques Edmond Joseph. (1906). ''Dictionnaire d'histoire et de géographie du Japon''; Papinot, (2003)">DF 56 of 80">("Sanada," ''Nobiliare du Japon'', p. 52

Odawara Hōjō is a city in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 188,482 and a population density of 1,700 persons per km2. The total area of the city is . Geography Odawara lies in the Ashigara Plains, in the far western ...

clan. In 1589, Toyotomi Hideyoshi attempted to arbitrate the dispute by giving Numata to the Hōjō and awarding nearby Nagurumi Castle to the Sanada. However, the Hōjō castellan Inomata Kuninori was dissatisfied with this arrangement and attacked the Sanada. However, after the defeat of the Hojo at the Battle of Odawara in 1590 the control of Numata was firmly restored to the Sanada. Sanada Nobuyuki comprehensively rebuilt on a vast scale Numata Castle in 1597, incorporating stone walls and a large five-story donjon and several three-story '' yagura''. Numata became a separate domain from the main Sanada holding at

Ueda Castle is a Japanese castle located in Ueda, northern Nagano Prefecture, Japan. At the end of the Edo period, Ueda Castle was home to a cadet branch of the Matsudaira clan, ''daimyō'' of Ueda Domain, but the castle is better known for its associatio ...

in 1656. However, in 1681 Sanada Nobutoshi was dispossessed by the Tokugawa shogunate for gross under-representation of his revenues, and the castle of destroyed. Numata Domain was restored in 1703 and given to

Honda Masanaga is a Japanese public multinational conglomerate manufacturer of automobiles, motorcycles, and power equipment, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Honda has been the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer since 1959, reaching a producti ...

, who rebuilt Numata Castle on a smaller scale by re-excavating some of the filled-in moats and restoring some of the earthen works, but a new donjon or yagura were never built. The castle then passed into the hands of a junior branch of the

Kuroda clan Kuroda (written: lit. "black ricefield") is a Japanese surname. Notable people with the surname include: *, Japanese painter *Akinobu Kuroda 黒田明伸, Japanese historian *Chris Kuroda, lighting designer and operator for the band Phish and Jus ...

before passing into the hands of the

in 1742. The Toki resided in a residence built within the third bailey, but the "castle" remained little more than a ''

jin'ya A was a type of administrative headquarters in the Tokugawa Shogunate during the Edo period of Japanese history. ''Jin'ya'' served as the seat of the administration for a small domain, a province, or additional parcels of land. ''Jin'ya'' hous ...

''. In 1912, a former samurai in the service of the Toki clan, Kume Tamenosuke, purchased the castle site, and he donated it to the town of Numata in 1926 for use as a park. The park contains the Ubukata House, an

structure that was once used as a pharmacy in the Numata castle town. The structure is an Important Cultural Property and serves as a local history museum. It also contains a scale model of Numata Castle under the Sanada. Numata Castle was listed as one of　the

Continued Top 100 Japanese Castles The is a list of 100 castles, intended as a sequel of 100 Fine Castles of Japan The castles in were chosen based on their significance in culture, history, and in their regions by the in 2006. In 2017, Japanese Castle Association created an ad ...

in 2017.

References

Literature

* * * * *

External links

Jcastle Profile
{{Continued Top 100 Japanese Castles Castles in Gunma Prefecture Sanada clan Go-Hōjō clan