A history of the Japanese people

by F. Brinkley; Dairoku Kikuchi

NOBUNAGA'S POSITION

It was at this time, according to Japanese annalists, that Nobunaga seriously conceived the ambition of making Kyoto his goal. The situation offered inducements. In the presence of a practically acknowledged conviction that no territorial baron of that era might venture to engage in an enterprise which denuded his territory of a protecting army, it was necessary to look around carefully before embarking upon the Kyoto project. Nobunaga had crushed the Imagawa, for though his victory had not been conclusive from a military point of view, it had placed the Imagawa under incompetent leadership and had thus freed Owari from all menace from the littoral provinces on the east. Again, in the direction of Echigo and Shinano, the great captain, Uesugi Kenshin, dared not strike at Nobunaga's province without exposing himself to attack from Takeda Shingen. But Shingen was not reciprocally hampered. His potentialities were always an unknown quality. He was universally recognized as the greatest strategist of his time, and if Nobunaga ventured to move westward, the Kai baron would probably seize the occasion to lay hands upon Owari. It is true that the alliance with Tokugawa Ieyasu constituted some protection. But Ieyasu was no match for Shingen in the field. Some other check must be devised, and Nobunaga found it in the marriage of his adopted daughter to Shingen's son, Katsuyori.

THE COURT APPEALS TO NOBUNAGA

In Kyoto, at this time, a state of great confusion existed. The Emperor Okimachi had ascended the throne in 1557. But in the presence of the violent usurpations of the Miyoshi and others, neither the sovereign nor the shogun could exercise any authority, and, as has been shown already, the Throne was constantly in pecuniarily embarassed circumstances. Nobunaga's father, Nobuhide, had distinguished himself by subscribing liberally to aid the Court financially, and this fact being now recalled in the context of Nobunaga's rapidly rising power, the Emperor, in the year 1562, despatched Tachiri Munetsugu nominally to worship at the shrine of Atsuta, but in reality to convey to Nobunaga an Imperial message directing him to restore order in the capital. The Owari baron received this envoy with marked respect. It is recorded that he solemnly performed the ceremony of lustration and clothed himself in hitherto unworn garments on the occasion of his interview with the envoy. It was not in his power, however, to make any definite arrangement as to time. He could only profess his humble determination to obey the Imperial behest, and promise the utmost expedition. But there can be no doubt that the arrival of this envoy decided the question of a march to Kyoto, though some years were destined to elapse before the project could be carried out.

Two things were necessary, however, namely, a feasible route and a plausible pretext. Even in those times, when wars were often undertaken merely for the purpose of deciding personal supremacy, there remained sufficient public morality to condemn any baron who suffered himself to be guided openly by ambition alone. Some reasonably decent cause had to be found. Now the Emperor, though, as above stated, communicating his will verbally to Nobunaga, had not sent him any written commission. The necessary pretext was furnished, however, by the relations between the members of the Saito family of Mino province, which lay upon the immediate north of Owari, and constituted the most convenient road to Kyoto. Hidetatsu, the head of that family, had fought against Nobunaga's father, Nobuhide, and one of the conditions of peace had been that the daughter of Hidetatsu should become the wife of Nobunaga.

Subsequently, the Saito household was disturbed by one of the family feuds so common during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in Japan. Hidetatsu, desiring to disinherit his eldest son, Yoshitatsu, had been attacked and killed by the latter, and Nobunaga announced his intention of avenging the death of his father-in-law. But before this intention could be carried out, Yoshitatsu died (1561), and his son, Tatsuoki, a man of little resource or ability, had to bear the onset from Owari. Nobunaga, at the head of a large force, crossed the Kiso River into Mino. But he found that, even under the leadership of Tatsuoki, the Mino men were too strong for him, and he was ultimately compelled to adopt the device of erecting on the Mino side of the river a fortress which should serve at once as a basis of military operations and as a place for establishing relations with the minor families in the province. The building of this fort proved a very difficult task, but it was finally accomplished by a clever device on the part of Hideyoshi, who, a master of intrigue as well as of military strategy, subsequently won over to Nobunaga's cause many of the principal vassals of the Saito family, among them being Takenaka Shigeharu, who afterwards proved a most capable lieutenant to Hideyoshi.

These preliminaries arranged, Nobunaga once more crossed the Kiso (1564) at the head of a large army, and after many days of severe fighting, captured the castle of Inaba-yama, which had been strongly fortified by Yoshitatsu, and was deemed impregnable. Nobunaga established his headquarters at this castle, changing its name to Gifu, and thus extending his dominion over the province of Mino as well as Owari. He had now to consider whether he would push on at once into the province of Omi, which alone lay between him and Kyoto, or whether he would first provide against the danger of a possible attack on the western littoral of Owari from the direction of Ise. He chose the latter course, and invaded Ise at the head of a considerable force. But he here met with a repulse at the hands of Kusunoki Masatomo, who to the courage and loyalty of his immortal ancestor, Masashige, added no small measure of strategical ability. He succeeded in defending his castle of Yada against Nobunaga's attacks, and finally the Owari general, deceived by a rumour to the effect that Takeda Shingen had reached the neighbourhood of Gifu with a strong army, retired hurriedly from Ise.

It may here be mentioned that three years later, in 1568, Hideyoshi succeeded in inducing all the territorial nobles of northern Ise, except Kusunoki Masatomo, to place themselves peacefully under Nobunaga's sway. Hideyoshi's history shows him to have been a constant believer in the theory that a conquered foe generally remains an enemy, whereas a conciliated enemy often becomes a friend. Acting on this conviction and aided by an extraordinary gift of persuasive eloquence, he often won great victories without any bloodshed. Thus he succeeded in convincing the Ise barons that Nobunaga was not swayed by personal ambition, but that his ruling desire was to put an end to the wars which had devastated Japan continuously for more than a century. It is right to record that the failures made by Nobunaga himself in his Ise campaign were in the sequel of measures taken in opposition to Hideyoshi's advice, and indeed the annals show that this was true of nearly all the disasters that overtook Nobunaga throughout his career, whereas his many and brilliant successes were generally the outcome of Hideyoshi's counsels.

ANOTHER SUMMONS FROM THE EMPEROR

In November, 1567, the Emperor again sent Tachiri Munetsugu to invite Nobunaga's presence in Kyoto. His Majesty still refrained from the dangerous step of giving a written commission to Nobunaga, but he instructed Munetsugu to carry to the Owari chieftain a suit of armour and a sword. Two years previously to this event, the tumult in Kyoto had culminated in an attack on the palace of the shogun Yoshiteru, the conflagration of the building, and the suicide of the shogun amid the blazing ruins. Yoshiteru's younger brother, Yoshiaki, effected his escape from the capital, and wandered about the country during three years, supplicating one baron after another to take up his cause. This was in 1568, just nine months after the Emperor's second message to Nobunaga, and the latter, acting upon Hideyoshi's advice, determined to become Yoshiaki's champion, since by so doing he would represent not only the sovereign but also the shogun in the eyes of the nation. Meanwhile—and this step also was undertaken under Hideyoshi's advice—a friendly contract had been concluded with Asai Nagamasa, the most powerful baron in Omi, and the agreement had been cemented by the marriage of Nobunaga's sister to Nagamasa.