Katsumata Castle

Architecture, patrimoine et histoire · Préfecture de Shizuoka

Katsumata Castle (勝間田城) stands on a hill about 130 m high overlooking the upper valley of the Katsumata River, which flows from the Makinohara Plateau into Suruga Bay. It was the seat of the Katsumata clan, a local warrior family that arose to administer and protect the Katsuta estate and served the Kamakura and then the Muromachi shogunates. Probably built in the 14th century, with no precise date known, the castle controlled the approaches to the Tōkaidō highway. During the Ōnin War the Katsumata sided with Shiba Yoshikado; in 1476 Imagawa Yoshitada seized the stronghold, ending the clan's power. The site then appears to have served as a supply base. The castle covers about 300 m by 200 m: several enclosures spread along the ridges of the hill in an inverted V shape, with a central keep area surrounded by earthen walls, small subsidiary enclosures and a series of dry moats cut across the ridges. No buildings survive, but the earthworks are remarkably well preserved, and excavations carried out since the 1980s have uncovered building foundations and artefacts. The site, laid out for visitors, lies amid the tea plantations of the Makinohara Plateau.