Shizukuishi Castle

Architecture, patrimoine et histoire · Préfecture d'Iwate

In the heart of the Shizukuishi basin, west of Morioka, Shizukuishi Castle (雫石城), also known as the Shizukuishi gosho or Hachiman-date, occupied the tip of a plateau rising some ten metres above the surrounding wet lowlands. Sources date it to around 1340, when the Southern Court faction made it one of its bases: Kitabatake Akinobu stayed there until the autumn of 1351. According to tradition, the area had previously belonged to the Tozawa clan, whose main branch moved to Kakunodate, in Dewa, in 1423. In 1540, the invasion led by Nanbu Harumasa drove out Tozawa Masayasu; a branch of the Shiba clan then settled on the site, henceforth called a "gosho", a lordly residence, and the works of this period are attributed to Ayaori Echizen Hironobu, who came from Tōno. After three campaigns led by Nanbu Nobunao from 1584 onwards, the stronghold was besieged and destroyed in 1586. The terraced layout aligned from east to west over some 250 metres and a broad V-shaped moat remain legible, even though the site is now built over with housing and crossed by a prefectural road.