Nitta Yoshisada

Nitta Yoshisada ( Japanese 新 田 義 貞 ; * 1301 ; † 1338 ) came from the ancient Minamoto clan .

He was a samurai in Kōzuke Province . He worked his way up to one of the greatest generals of the emperor at the time and was revered as a role model for the samurai because of his extraordinary courage and fighting strategies. Nitta is still considered a good example of loyalty today.

He became famous for his participation in the war (known as the Genkō Rebellion ) between the Shikken Hōjō Takatoki and the Tennō Go-Daigo . First he fought for the Shikken, but after the defection of Ashikaga Takauji also changed sides and fought alongside Takauji and Kusunoki Masashige for the emperor. First he besieged Kamakura , the seat of the shogunate . To take the city, Nitta Yoshisada needed a ruse, as it was defended by more than 150,000 warriors of the Hōjō : he had thousands of mounted samurai swim across the bay of Kamakura, which could then attack the unpaved sea side of the city. The members of the Hōjō government committed suicide by seppuku .

When Takauji rebelled against the emperor, Masashige and Yoshisada fought him. In 1336 Takauji succeeded in winning the decisive battle at Minatogawa and killing Masashige. Yoshisada fought for the emperor for two more years. In 1338, during a battle, an Ashikaga arrow struck his horse and he was buried under the animal; to avoid capture by enemy troops, Yoshisada cut off his own head. His servants fled with his head and buried him in the mountains. Today the small stone statue Kaifukijizou 貝 吹 地 蔵, which represents the god Kshitigarbha , stands at the presumed location .

The story of Ashikaga Takauji , Emperor Go-Daigo , Nitta Yoshisada and Kusunoki Masashige from the Genko War to the establishment of the northern and southern imperial courts ( Namboku-chō ) is described in detail in the forty-volume epic Taiheiki .

In 1876 the Fujishima shrine was dedicated to him in Fukui (near the place where he died), where he is venerated as a kami with his brother and three sons .

literature

• Stephen Turnbull: Samurai: The World of the Warrior . Osprey Publishing, 2003.
• Iso Mutsu: Kamakura. Fact and Legend . Tuttle Publishing, Tokyo 1995, ISBN 0-8048-1968-8 .