Tsuwano Castle

Architecture, patrimoine et histoire · Préfecture de Shimane

On the summit of Mount Reiki (about 360 m), some 200 m above the small town of Tsuwano, Tsuwano Castle is one of the few mountain castles that remained in use throughout the Edo period. Its foundation is attributed to Yoshimi Yoriyuki, sent to western Iwami Province after the Mongol invasions: according to tradition, he laid out the castle in 1295 and his son Yorinao completed it in 1324. The Yoshimi lived there for eleven generations. After the Battle of Sekigahara, Sakazaki Naomori, installed in 1601, turned the medieval castle into a modern fortress with high stone walls and added the Oribe-maru outwork to the north. After his fall in 1616, Kamei Masanori arrived in 1617; his descendants held the castle for eleven generations until it was abandoned in the Meiji era. The three-storey keep, struck by lightning in 1686, was never rebuilt. Impressive stone walls survive, notably those of the Taiko-maru and the hostage turret, together with two turrets at the foot of the mountain. A chairlift climbs close to the summit; on autumn and winter mornings the walls seem to float above the mist. Designated in 1942, the site is one of the 100 Fine Castles of Japan.