Anegawa Castle

Architecture, patrimoine et histoire · Préfecture de Saga

In the heart of the Saga Plain, on the left bank of the Nakaji-Egawa River, Anegawa Castle is an example of a lowland fortress built not on a height but in the midst of water. Its grounds were divided by a mesh-like network of canals that isolated the various plots and turned the site into a true fortified complex associated with a moated hamlet. Tradition attributes its foundation, around 1360, to Kikuchi Takeyasu, a member of the powerful Kikuchi clan of Higo; his descendants, who took the name Anegawa, made it their residence. In the Sengoku period, the Anegawa first gravitated around the Shōni, then came under the authority of Ryūzōji Takanobu, in whose service the stronghold withstood an offensive by Ōtomo Yoshishige. In 1572 the family received new lands and left Anegawa, after which the castle fades from history. Excavations have uncovered the remains of the residence and the hamlet, and the rarity of this grid of canals led to the site's designation as a National Historic Site in 2010.