Narumi Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

Narumi Castle, also called Negoya-jō, stood on high ground above the old post town of Narumi on the Tōkaidō, in Nagoya's Midori ward. Attributed to Yasuhara Munenori in the Ōei era (from 1394), it became a major prize between the Oda and the Imagawa. Its lord Yamaguchi Noritsugu, at first an ally of Oda Nobuhide, went over to the Imagawa after Nobuhide's death; the young Nobunaga failed to retake it in 1553. In 1559 Nobunaga ringed Narumi with three forts, Tange, Zenshōji and Nakajima, to cut off its supplies. During the battle of Okehazama in 1560 the castle was held by Okabe Motonobu, an Imagawa general, who held out after Imagawa Yoshimoto's death and surrendered the place only in exchange for his lord's head. Nobunaga's retainers Sakuma Nobumori and then Masakatsu were its later lords until it was abandoned around 1590. The site is now a small park; the city of Nagoya carried out excavations there in 1990-1991 and in later years.